Cookie Hell
by wuemsel
Summary: Jesse´s losing his mind. But what´s causing it? STORY - believe it!!! - NOW COMPLETE! COMPLE-HETE!!! YEAAH!!!! Thanks for all the reviews!!!
1. Default Chapter

Hiya! This is my first "DM"-Story ever. Hope you like it, well, a bit at least. I´m German, therefor it´s rather probable that my English isn´t all that great; hope, it´s readable, though. I´m not making any profit out of this, yadda, yadda, yadda, you know the drill. The character´s don´t belong to me (Sigh!) as long as they don´t belong to me, that is, a few do, but most of them aren´t even real ... `kay, that´s it. Enjoy the cookies.  
  
  
  
Cookie Hell  
  
People didn´t think about the reasons they once had to become a doctor. It wasn´t a clever thing to do to think about those reasons. Like newborn babies lose their innocent beauty once they grow up and learn to be human, the motives we have crumble like leafes when we actually get where they´ve led us. They crumble and fall, and in the end there´s nothing left when we open our hands in the hour of death. Nothing to hold onto.  
  
"You know, that´s one dark opening."  
  
Dr. Amanda Bentley sighed deeply and snatched the book out of her friend´s hands. The young man flinched; great, he had said something wrong. The one thing you didn´t want to do to Amanda was to say something wrong.  
  
"I knew you wouldn´t understand it!" she stated, looking at the first sentences of the novel for herself now.  
  
"It's not just "dark"", she said, immitating the other one´s voice, "it´s beautiful. In a sad way."  
  
The man raised his brows sceptically. "You think it´s beautiful that when we die there´s nothing in our hands to hold on, just ... what was it? ... Crumbled motives? How can motives crumble, anyways?"  
  
"It´s a metaphor, Jesse! And it´s a good one."  
  
"It´s depressing," he contradicted, picking a cookie out of a bag he had brought with him to the Doctor´s Lounge, where he´d met Amanda and the crumbled motives, which were inhabitants of "Holy Tears".  
  
Amanda rolled her eyes. "That´s what you said about "House of God", too. As far as you´re concerned, every book´s depressing."  
  
"Every book you read," he replied, mouth full of cookie.  
  
"It´s just because you never finish them. "House of God" has a happy ending."  
  
"You gotta be kidding."  
  
"No, it all works out fine for him and he realizes how much he´s changed since working in that hospital, and then he returns to his girlfriend and is happy again."  
  
"That sucks! For all I read of it, this guy could never be happy again. He´s screwed up since page 200 or sooner. And if things actually go okay again, it´s not realistic." He picked another cookie without noticing Amanda´s slight frown. "That book wants to be mean, happy ending or not. It is mean and it makes you feel bad! I hated every page of it." He gave his auditorium a final nod and swallowed, already producing a new cookie.  
  
"It made you feel bad?" Amanda grinned. She had suggested Jesse to read "House of God", because she thought everybody working in a hospital should. Jesse had returned it two days later, saying he just didn´t have enough time to read.  
  
"Well ... it´s ... Just don´t give me that one, `kay? I won´t read it."  
  
"Hmmm," Dr. Bentley made, obviuosly starting to enjoy where this was heading to. "When did your motives crumble to dust?"  
  
"When I came to page 30."  
  
The pathologist laughed sympatheically, patting her friend´s arm. "Okay, I give up. I´m never gonna make an intellectual out of you. Some people just don´t have it."  
  
Jesse scratched his temple. "There was a compliment in that, right? Oh, no, wait, it was this other thing - what´s it called? - Oh yeah, insult." He grabbed another cookie in mock frustration.  
  
This time Amanda snatched the bag out of it hands, studying it.  
  
"Jess, you´ve been eating cookies all day long, do you know that?"  
  
"Yeah. Give it back."  
  
His request was ignored. "D´you wanna tell me why?"  
  
"No, I want a cookie."  
  
"Tell me what´s bothering you and we´ll see."  
  
"Why does there have to be something bothering me just because I´m eating cookies? Gee, can´t a man just sit here and enjoy some regressive inclinations?!"  
  
"Wow, that bad."  
  
"Don´t got there, Amanda," he said, trying and failing to catch a cookie out of the bag once more. "I will not talk about it."  
  
She shrugged and remained silent.  
  
It didn´t take five seconds for him to sink down in his chair frustratedly. "Ooookay, I give up. I´m weak." He did his best sick-puppy-look which he had learned to use in times of crisis.  
  
Smiling triumphantly, Amandad handed the bag over, raising her brows in expectation.  
  
All she got was a scowl, though. "Boy, am I glad I´m not one of your kids. But then, hey, I´m being treated the same way, so what´s the difference!"  
  
"Right," she grinned back and earned a sigh. "So what´s wrong?"  
  
"Nothin´."  
  
"Jesseeee."  
  
"Got a call from my mom yesterday."  
  
"Uuuh." Amanda made a face and pointed at the bag. "Call me if you´re out of them, I´ll get you a new one."  
  
Jesse smiled gratefully. "No, it wasn´t that bad, just ..." He stopped, obviously trying to figure out how exactly it had been. In the end he picked another cookie.  
  
"Want one?" he asked muffeldly.  
  
"Do you know how much fat is in this stuff? And sugar?"  
  
"Sure. It´s written on the backside." He searched for the perversly colorful chart of calorines on the bag and turned it for Amanda to see. "Here."  
  
"Gee, that´s even more than I thought," she stated whilst grabbing one out of the bag.  
  
Chewing in union, the two doctors sat in silence for a few minutes.  
  
"Is there anybody at this place who ever does some actual work? At least from time to time?" a sudden voice interrupted the peaceful moment.  
  
Without even gazing up, Jesse shook his head. "Nope. Just go here every day for the coffee. You?" he glanced at Amanda.  
  
"The examination tables are far more comfortable than my couch at home, so ..."  
  
"Yeah, yeah," Jesse nodded in mock agreement.  
  
The intruder, a police detective, who actually was the one person in the room not having worked a 24hour-shift, grimaced at his friends and sat down. "They´re handing out funny papers in the mess now?"  
  
When there was absolutley no reaction to his wise-crack, the detective looked at one after the other, then rolled his eyes. "Gee - who died?"  
  
The doctors looked up, raising their brows in union.  
  
"That didn´t come out the way I planned it," he winked. "Just imagine I´ve said something completely different, `kay?"  
  
They gave him a nod.  
  
"So, what´s with you guys?" he asked.  
  
"We´re bored," Jesse replied, "but now you´ve arrived with another exciting case you planned to fill us in, right, Steve?"  
  
"Ah ... no." Frowning, he picked up the book still laying on the table. " "Holy Tears"?"  
  
"It´s Amanda´s," Jesse filled him in. "It´s about crumbled motives, and it makes you kill yourself after 10 pages."  
  
Amanda shook her head now, Steve smiled. "I seldom have time to read, anyways." He handed her back the book.  
  
"Oh - men!"  
  
Jesse shrugged, unimpressedly. "Want one?" he asked, holding up the cookie- bag.  
  
Steve gazed at him unsurely. "Ah ... no, thanks. Is my Dad around anywhere?" Bored doctors made him nervous, he decided.  
  
"I haven´t seen him for a while," Jesse answered. "Maybe he´s in class."  
  
"Okay, then I ..."  
  
Sudden movement outside the lounge made Jesse tense, then rush out. Just a second before Steve could ask the "Huh?"-question, he also heard the muffled voices and the sound of a gurney being shoved over the floor. Looking outside the window, he now saw two medics hurrying in with a patient.  
  
Amanda stood to go out and see if she could help.  
  
Steve followed her, asking: "How does he do that?"  
  
"ER-training."  
  
It took hours to finally lose the patient. He sure put up a fight, struggled with all his will. At times, the young doctor at his side silently begged him to give in, for the was no chance to win. Not this time.  
  
When it was over at last, Jesse turned and left the room without looking back at the patient. He couldn´t bear the look he´d be confronted with. The man had died with his eyes open, fear written all over his face, which was drawn like a grimace of pain.  
  
As if death hadn´t come on silent feet to this soul, offering a hand, guiding him away from his mortal self, but grabbed the struggling mind out of it´s body instead. Forcing him to leave, fighting with him, winning in the end.  
  
As he walked along the corridor, seeing no one, clenching and unclenching his hands unconsciously, Jesse felt the sensation of failure crawling into every part of his body. Like he´d been infected by the patient´s own failure to hold on to life.  
  
His legs felt heavy, not to mention his head. He wouldn´t look up even when he was greeted by a colleague passing by.  
  
This guy hadn´t just died, he had lost, Jesse thought bitterly. "Gee, listen to me, I´m sounding like Amanda´s books now. Gotta go home."  
  
Having made his decision, he passed the Doctor´s Lounge, but couldn´t avoid to be spotted by Mark Sloan, who rushed out to call after him.  
  
Jesse´s shoulders sacked, but still he turned to face the older doctor. "Hey Mark. Look, I´m really whacked, I´d better be going."  
  
Mark nodded understandingly and approached his friend with a worried look on his face. "You okay?"  
  
Jesse smiled. Though he didn´t like people worrying about him, he appreciated it. It gave him the sensation of feeling wanted, and still he longed to feel that way. He couldn´t help it. "Yes, I´m fine," he assured, adding: "Lost a patient", because he knew Mark would understand and stop asking him about it.  
  
"Oh, sorry to hear that. The suicide who came in around noon?"  
  
Without knowing why, Jesse tensed. Surprised, he realized that it was out of anger. "It wasn´t suicide. It was a test."  
  
"Test?" Mark repeated, frowning.  
  
Before the younger doctor could answer, Amanda approached them, having left the lift. She was in a particularly good mood, humming to herself and asked: "What was a test?"  
  
"The man who came in the ER today," Jesse explained. "Dr. Townsend. British. He´d worked on a project for about three years and, well, he ... tested the product on himself. Guess he should have waited a little longer," he added without humor showning in his smile.  
  
Amanda narrowed her eyes. "He tested a new medicine on himself? What against?"  
  
"Alzheimer."  
  
"But he didn´t have it, did he?" she asked.  
  
Jesse shook his head. "No. I asked him. He doesn´t have it in the family, too. He just ... felt it was his duty. As a doctor." He fell silent, observing the floor.  
  
Observing him, Mark felt a sharp look that hit him like an elbow. Glanzing at the producer of said look, he put a hand on the smaller man´s shoulder. "Are you sure, you´re okay?"  
  
Jesse smiled shyly. "Yeah. - I don´t know."  
  
He bowed his head again. "It´s just ... what if I´d succeeded in saving him? Maybe he coulda worked it over. There´s no remedy against Alzheimer. What if he found it, at least came close to finding it? Now with him dying of it, no one will continue his works. They´ll put it in a box marked "failed" and forget about it."  
  
"Well, it did fail," Amanda pointed out. "It cost his life."  
  
Jesse didn´t look at her, his gaze had drifted of to nowhere. "He, like ... He trusted us, he trusted me. To do for him what he tried to do for thousands of people. If I´d saved him ..."  
  
Finally he looked up on his friends, who both eyed him with a mixture of awe and concern.  
  
He smiled and winked. "Oh, forget that. I know I´m not to blame, I did everything I could. It´s just ... I don´t know. I think it´s that I kinda admire him for what he tried to do." A melancholy grin hushed over his face. "It was a real doctor-thing to do, huh?"  
  
Amanda sneered. "Try stupid," she said. "He should have known better than to go and test his product on himself. It´s unethical. And illegal."  
  
"Do you know how many people die of Alzheimer every year?" Jesse asked instead of a reply.  
  
The pathologist hushed, glancing at Mark in search for help.  
  
But the older doctor simply patted his friend´s shoulder again, showing his best fatherly smile. "You should be going home now, Jess. You look extremely tired."  
  
Lost in thoughts again, Jesse nodded and turned without even saying goodbye. His friends watched him shuffle along the floor, till he reached the lift and entered it.  
  
"I say we should be happy that there are low chances on him operating on himself," Amanda stated, still looking at the by now closed doors of the lift. "He´d probably try a brain-transplantation."  
  
Mark laughed softly, but shook his head. "Passion of the youth," he pointed out, holding his hands out before him in a gesture of greatness.  
  
"More like ignorance of the youth. Young physicians alyways wanna play god. They think they´re immortal or gifted or I don´t know. They should come to my lab from time to time. You don´t get carried away about immortality there."  
  
Again, Mark laughed, looking down on her with clear respect showing in his eyes. "Aren´t you a little too young to be that wise?"  
  
"Have you read "House of God"?"  
  
"Ah ... no," he replied; it sounded like a question, though.  
  
"I´ll give it to you some time. You´ll love it." With that she went on to the reception table, leaving him to turn to go and almost bumb into a young girl, who´d been about to tip his back with her finger.  
  
"Oh - I´m sorry," he apologised. "I didn´t notice ... You shouldn´t sneak up on people like that, you know?"  
  
"I´m sorry," she said, her voice shaking a little. So did the whole girl, Mark suddenly noticed.  
  
"Can I help you?" he asked, doctor-mode taking over.  
  
"I came to see my father. I was told ... Someone called me at home and said he´d been taking here." She smiled nervously, her eyes wandering around to not meet his.  
  
"You know, I´m, like, I´m sick. I´ve got the flu. Well, it´s almost over, but still I wasn´t in school today and stuff, and I thought I shouldn´t go to a hospital like when I´m sick, because of all the sick people, they might get it from me and then, I don´t know, like die, but ..." The need of air caused her to pause a second in order to breath.  
  
Mark had actually fallen in staring at her. The words were still working on forming themselfes to sentences in his ears.  
  
Ignoring his confused look, the girl continued: "Anyway, I told the lady on the phone I was sick and, like, you know, I didn´t wanna come here, but, well, she, like ..."  
  
Her voice drifted off to normal speed till she said the first sentence Mark could understand right away: "She said my father was in a very serious condition. I should come here right away."  
  
Her gaze dropped, the sudden silence seemed louder than her talking before. Though he couldn´t put a finger on it, Mark knew instinctly that there was something really bad about all this. He felt himself being drawn into something he neither wanted nor actually had to do.  
  
Still, he asked friendly: "What´s your name?" and led her to the reception table.  
  
"Townsend," the girl answered. "Tori Townsend. My father´s a doctor in Cardiff. We moved here for him to carry on on his studys and ..." She hushed, noticing the almost painful look on his face. Within seconds, her face lost all its color.  
  
"What is it? Something ... happened, like ...? Where´s my father?"  
  
Mark swallowed. Gee, he hated this. Years of experience hadn´t made it easier at all. It was still the one thing he hated about his job. Calmly, he took the girl´s arm in order to lead her to the nearby Doctor´s Lounge.  
  
"Come, Tori. Why don´t we sit down in there for a while and I'll fill you in about your father, okay?"  
  
At his touch she tensed, but didn´t move. "Is he dead?"  
  
Mark sighed inwardly. "I really think it´d be better to sit down and ..."  
  
She cut him off, suddenly speaking very clearly, pronouncing every word. "Is. He. Dead?"  
  
"Yes, he is. I´m sorry." He let go off her, giving her space to take in the words.  
  
Most people didn´t get them first. They´d ask for them again or simply stare at the one having said them or started to cry.  
  
Tori Townsend took a deep breath which made Mark prepare himself, then gave him the smallest of smiles, a simple polite gesture and nodded.  
  
"Thank you," she said, "I´m sure you did everything you could, and I´m grateful for that. Now, will you excuse me?"  
  
Mark felt his chin fall down. "Tori," he called her back.  
  
She turned around. "Yes?"  
  
"I wasn´t the responsible doctor. Maybe you want me to call him so that he could fill you in on the deatils. Sometimes that helps."  
  
"Thanks, you´re nice. But I know the details. He tried his stuff on himself, didn´t he?"  
  
Mark nodded.  
  
She smiled humorlessly. "See, I´m one attentive daughter, huh?"  
  
A single tear fell down her cheek, a hand rushed up to wipe it away. "At least," she added with a voice so cold it sounded strange on a child, "I told him how much I hated him for all of this. I bet I told him a dozen times. Guess, he died knowing it, hu? Wouldn´t have wanted him to leave without knowing how much I hated him."  
  
She was crying now, but still trying to keep a grip on herself, wiping her hand over her eyes from time to time. It was an unbearable sight. She couldn´t be older than fifteen, sixteen at most, and all of a sudden she looked like fifty. She lost her youth within a heartbeat.  
  
Like her father had lost his life. By testing a medicine for people who lost their memories. It appeared as if loss had decided to take its turn at last. Forget about love and hate, here comes the emotion without passion, the unbeatable foe.  
  
Mark felt that he´d actually fight the urge to grab and ruttle this kid out of her misery  
  
. "You don´t mean all that," he said and listened to the echo. Boy, that was one lame thing to say, doctor.  
  
Tori opened her mouth to object, but closed it as if it was forever, shrugged at him and turned to leave. 


	2. Cookie Hell 2

Hi! This is the second part of "Cookie Hell" and madness still doesn´t take it´s toe ...  
  
There are even no cookies in it now. But cocktails!  
  
Yeah, knew you´d like that, too.  
  
Okay, enjoy the White Russians then.  
  
Thanks for the reviews, by the way. Specially StrangePenguin! Obst rules!  
  
All disclaimers still the same.  
  
  
  
  
  
If bored doctors made him nervous, being bored himself drove him crazy.  
  
Steve Sloan sat in his car, having experienced the one day in the year where there had been absolutely nothing to do, not even paper-work to get done, and felt the nagging thought, that something really terrible simply just had to happen on a day like this, scratching on the inside of the back of his head. He scratched the spot himself, trying to make it go away.  
  
He was on his way to "BBQ Bob´s" to close it up - and what a task it was for a bored man!  
  
Actually it´d been his partner´s task today, but having seen the patient being carried in the ER that day, Steve doubted that Jesse would show up.  
  
That had to be understood, and , well, he did, but - "Why of all people does my business-partner have to be a doctor?! And not one with an office or stuff, no, course not, it has to be an ER-doctor who´s to work on every of his turns of bar-dutys!  
  
Why do I have to drive there and close up the damn bar? It´s not my turn. I could be at home by now. Watching sports. Reading." He sighed. "Continue being bored. There are a lot of things I could do ´sides working and ... Oh, gee, who am I trying to kid? There´s nobody here. Now I´m talking to myself!"  
  
The realization of said fact didn´t keep him from continuing till he reached the bar and parked in a side street.  
  
He was still murmuring to himself, when he opened the door. The sign on it already had been turned to "closed".  
  
"`kay, I´m here," he called, "Sorry I´m late, traffic´s murder. Thanks for waiting. You can go now."  
  
No response.  
  
Out of reflex, the hairs on Steve´s neck started to stretch out to their full size.  
  
"Great," he thought, "I just knew something was going to happen. Me bored and reality don´t mix."  
  
It was a simple reflex to reach out for his gun while he slowly stepped forward into the bar.  
  
"Hello? Someone there?"  
  
"Hey."  
  
Jumping, the detective whirled around, gun in hands.  
  
"Woah!" The supposed intruder´s hands came up in a rush, while there was already a grin forming on his lips. "Ah ..." he added, as he saw his partner starting to regroup himself, "don´t shoot. Please."  
  
"Give me one good reason," Steve sneered, lowering his weapon and putting it away again. "Don´t do that to me, Jesse, it´s not funny."  
  
"Pretty funny from here," Jess grinned.  
  
Steve simply scowled at him, running a hand through his hair. He really had to stop being bored. It made him ...  
  
"Kinda jumpy, are we?" Jesse finished his thought and went behind the bar, still grinning brightly. "Maybe you should consider not carrying your weapon, when ..."  
  
"That´s enough, Jesse. I know I´ll never gonna hear the end of this, but for now, just leave it alone, `kay? What´re you doing here, anyway?"  
  
"Ah, close the bar?" Jesse answered, frowning at his obviously confused friend. "My turn, remember?"  
  
"I thought you had a patient?"  
  
"That happens," he joked, while producing some bottles from behind the bar, putting them on it next to the ice he´d get from the cool-house when Steve had entered. "Yet, I wouldn´t neglect my duties, now, would I?"  
  
"Oh. `kay," Steve said, observing Jesse´s task with his head lifted to one side as he would with something that crazy, he wouldn´t even mention it. "But the place should be closed since twenty minutes."  
  
"It is. Just because detectives can´t read "closed"-signs, doesn´t mean everything not locked up isn´t closed."  
  
Steve was getting really irritated. "Ahm ... But - what´re you doing here?"  
  
"Mixing cocktails," the young doctor replied with a smile, as if he´d just waited for Steve to ask. "Want one?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Sit down."  
  
Obeying, Steve sat down on the bar, watching Jesse preparing White Russians. "I didn´t know you could do that."  
  
"Hey," Jesse said, hurt, "I´ve been to college."  
  
Smiling at that, the detective decided to leave it and waited for his friend to shove the glass over the bar.  
  
"Cheers."  
  
They drank.  
  
"You know, this is actually ... good," Steve told surprisedly.  
  
"Why does that sound like you didn´t expected it to be?"  
  
"´cause I didn´t."  
  
"Yeah, thought so."  
  
They sat in silence for a while, both enjoying the quiet atmosphere of their own bar, till Steve shot his friend an uncertain look, asking: "Hey, ahm, you´re okay?"  
  
For a reason Steve couldn´t make out, Jesse sighed deeply.  
  
"Yes, I´m okay. What is it with you guys today? Can´t I consume anything ´cept coffee without sending off the alarms in your heads?"  
  
Steves´s brows had risen at this, now he added a smile to complete the perfect "Slow down"-look. "Kina edgy, are we?" he mocked his friend´s former question.  
  
"At least I don´t point a gun at somebody when I am. Coming to think about it, I never do."  
  
"Ooookay," Steve gave in, holding up his hands in defense. "You win. Now, bartender, care to make `nother one of those?"  
  
"Hm. Wasn´t that your car I saw beeing parked across the road?"  
  
"No, took a cap."  
  
"Oh. Then."  
  
Once again silence settled about the scenery, just two friends in a bar at night. "Hopper´d be delighted," Stebe thought and grinned contendedly.  
  
It was then the door was opened slightly, a shy-looking nose being peeked in. "Ahm, hello?"  
  
"We´re closed," the owners called out simultanously, without even looking at the door.  
  
"Then you´re sign is correct," came a friendly voice from the now fully opened door.  
  
Steve turned and saw a man of medium hight standing in the entry, smiling at him. He was in his mid-thirties, slim, and obviously nervous, referring to his clenching and unclenching hands at his sides.  
  
"Can we help you?" Jesse asked, having also turned to look at the stranger.  
  
"I don´t know," the man replied, then smiled again. "Or, no, I do know. It´s just ... Ahm, I´m your new neighbor. Sort of." He made a pause, then laughed softly, holding out his hand. "I´m sorry. Seamus Zeesley, hi."  
  
Steve smiled and shook the man´s hand. As did Jesse.  
  
"Steve Sloan," the detective introduced himself. "And that´s Jesse Travis, my business-partner."  
  
"Hi. I, ah, I hired that book-shop across the street. We´re planning on opening tomorrow, and there were still some shelves to be filled, so I worked on it till now, to get it done, you know. But now everything´s closed, and, ahm, I just moved to LA ..."  
  
He trickled off, giving them a sick-puppy-look Jesse could have been proud of, then smiled again, waving his hand. "You know, it was stupid to come here. I´d better be off and ..."  
  
"No, wait," Steve called him back and smiled assuringly. "I´m sure there´s something left in the kitchen. There usually is."  
  
"Yeah," Jesse agreed, "have a seat. I´ll go looking." He headed for the the kitchen.  
  
"Wow, thanks," Seamus Zeesley bursted out and sat within a second. "I´m starving."  
  
"Care for a drink, too?"  
  
"Ahm, yeah. Great. Thanks."  
  
"Bartender!"  
  
  
  
  
  
"That are the second-best ribs I´ve ever eaten, really," Seamus Zeesley stated an hour, a few ribs and two drinks later.  
  
In union, the two bar-owners´ eyes narrwoed.  
  
"Beg your pardon?" Steve asked.  
  
Smiling brightly at them, Zeesley nodded, as if the two looked liked they couldn´t believe the generousity of this compliment.  
  
"No, really," he confirmed them, "they´re great."  
  
"We know," Jesse told him.  
  
Looking at one after the other, realization suddenly hit the poor man, and he laughed slightly. "Oh. Oh, now I ... ah, yes. Well, you ever been to Chicago?"  
  
"Don´t tell us they make better ribs in Chicago," Steve warned him. "It´s not true."  
  
Slightly drunk, as they all were, he glanced over the bar to get the support he expected from there. But it wasn´t exactly support shown in Jesse´s eyes. Irritated, the detective tried the verbal way. "Right, Jess?"  
  
"Right," Jesse answered quickly, then bowed his head, stuttering, "not right. See, there is this place in Chicago called "Adam´s Ribs", and ..."  
  
As Steve stared his young friend into the ground, Zeesley grinned triumphantly, pointing at his witness. "See? Listen ta the kid. Maybe you should go out more often, Steve."  
  
"Maybe somebody should work on his loyalty," Steve suggested, still looking at Jesse who avoided his glare, till the detective gave it up and turned to Zeesley again. "And "Adam´s Ribs"´s a film, not a bar. It´s one of my dad´s favourites."  
  
"But it´s also a bar ..." Jess started, but hushed when confronted with Steve´s look-to-kill again.  
  
"Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy," Zeesley said and sighed. "Great movie. Saw it four times."  
  
"You like this old stuff?" Steve made a face.  
  
Zeesley smiled warmly. "I generally like old stuff."  
  
"Old books."  
  
Waving at Jesse, the man nodded. "Right. That´s why my shop´s called "Moriaty´s"."  
  
"After Professor Moriaty," the detective guessed and earned a cheers- gesture.  
  
"Who´s that?" the non-reader asked.  
  
While Zeesley laughed in amusement, Sloan shook his head in disbelief.  
  
"That´s the guy who killed Sherlock Holmes, Jess."  
  
"Wow, Sherlock Holmes died?" the poor kid was obviously shocked.  
  
Steve decided to simply ignore him and asked: "Why him? "Sherlock´s" woulda been nice, too."  
  
"I liked Moriaty better. I always liked the bad guys better. They´re more ... interesting." He took a sip of his drink. "And with Holmes being high all the time ... I wanted the name to be a statement. "No drugs". It has children´s books in it, you know." He bowed his brows in an uncly way.  
  
"Sherlock Holmes took drugs?"  
  
"Forgive my young friend, Seamus, he doesn´t read."  
  
"Hey, I do read. A lot. Just not ... recently. And I don´t like crime stories, anyway."  
  
"No?" Zeesley asked surprisedly. "Why not?"  
  
Steve chuckled, patting Jesse´s head. "He never reaches the conclusion before the ending."  
  
"That´s it, no more Russians for you."  
  
While the two friends continued teasing each other by simply shooting looks, Zeesley watched them amusedly.  
  
"So, how long you two been doing this? It´s a great place by the way. I always wanted to have a bar in Chicago, but my wife didn´t like the idea. She likes to read, though."  
  
"That´s a good reason," Steve said comfortingly, sipping at his drink, mumbling: "And Chicago sucks."  
  
"I heard that. Just because we have better ribs ..."  
  
"But no beaches," Jess interrupted, then thought it over. "Okay, yes, a beach, but ... no waves. And it´s cold."  
  
"Sears Tower."  
  
"Hollywood."  
  
"Bulls."  
  
"Ah ... Did I mention the weather?"  
  
"Indirectly," Zeesley nodded. "But you´re right, it´s that good, it counts twice. LA wins. That´s why I moved here."  
  
"Then you have to forget about this other place," Steve said, finally feeling like he´d defended his place´s hornor.  
  
"What place?"  
  
"Good boy. Jess," he ordered, pointing at Zeesley´s glass.  
  
"We´re out of milk."  
  
"So?" "Ah, yes," the smaller one nodded in understandment and put the bottle of vodka next to Zeesley´s glass.  
  
Zeesley looked at it, uncertain. He obviously remebered that he had to open a shop the next morning. "Uh," he said, but was interrupted by Steve filling his glass.  
  
"Doctor´s orders."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"That´s me," Jesse stated, finger up, "I´m the doctor. Drink it."  
  
"Oh. So you´re not only ..."  
  
"No, we have regular jobs," Steve grinned. Zeesley shot him a look.  
  
"And you´re ...?"  
  
"Police detective," Sloan told him.  
  
"Watch out, he has a gun."  
  
But Zeesley´s eyes had grown wide at the sound of that. "Wow. You´re a real cop? In LA? Like Marlowe ... no wait, he was a private. But, hey, like Columbo!"  
  
"Well, ah, sorta like that ..."  
  
"Hey, there are famous doctors on TV, too."  
  
"D´you really solve murder cases and stuff?"  
  
"What about Quincy?!"  
  
"Yes, I do."  
  
"Wow, that´s so cool. See, I´m writing a book. A novel. A crime novel. It´s set in a city and ... You know, may I ask you some questions at time? About your job? Just things you´re allowed to tell, nothing, like, classified or stuff."  
  
"Sure."  
  
"Thanks." Impressed, Zeesley swalloed his vodka. He was so excited, he even forgot to make a face.  
  
"That´s typical. Is there no doctor in your novel? He´s wow, ´cause he´s the cop, but I´m just a doctor."  
  
"Oh, no, one of the character´s a doctor," Zeesley assured him.  
  
"Really?"  
  
"Yeah, he´s the bad guy."  
  
Steve laughed so hard, he almost fell off his chair. Zeesley simply grinned.  
  
"Funny," Jesse stated. "That´s so funny. Whoever invited you over, anyway?"  
  
"Y-you know," Steve tried to say through his giggles, "I wanna have a copy of that novel, Seamus."  
  
"Sure thing. Call me Shay."  
  
  
  
  
  
One thing about hospitals: They were far too bright. And noisy. Couldn´t this people be a little considerate? They were doctors and nurses. They were supposed to be considerate, for god´s sake. But no, they were just loud and didn´t care wether they might bump into a colleage who´s head just might happen to be at the risk of exploding any second.  
  
"You know, you look exactly like Steve did this morning, only his eyes were closed most of the time."  
  
"Hm," Jesse replied, meaning that he wasn´t in the mood to be insulted. He figured "hm" would satisfy.  
  
But Mark Sloan being Mark Sloan he enjoyed this far too much to let it go by that soon. He hadn´t done with his son, either.  
  
"I take that as a "Please, Mark, sit down", " he grinned and sat down at the table in the Doctor´s Lounge, Jesse had chosen to place his head on. "Thanks. - Sooo, how´s it going?"  
  
"Hm."  
  
"Ah, yes, The patients are bleeding too loud, I expect?"  
  
"Pleeeaaaaseeee ..."  
  
But the world was out of mercy today. "You tried coffee?"  
  
"No, adrenalin."  
  
"Now you tell me. I should have given Steve some of it, too."  
  
"I hope he´s not feeling any better than I do, or it´d be really unfair."  
  
"Don´t worry, life´s fair enough."  
  
"Good."  
  
"He even managed to put his shirt on inside out, but he left the house, before I could tell him." Mark chuckled.  
  
Involuntarily, Jesse checked his clothings. He´d almost decided to at least try to swalloe some coffee, when Amanda entered the Lounge.  
  
"Hey," she greeted her friends and sat down. "How´s it ... Whatever happened to you?"  
  
"I got hit by a truck," Jess mumbled, while attempting to stay up and get the coffee.  
  
"At "BBQ Bob´s"," Mark explained. "With Steve."  
  
"What were you doing there? I thought you´d gone home yesterday."  
  
"Ahm ... I´m gonna get some coffee. Want some, too?"  
  
Amanda smiled. "I don´t think you´ll be able to carry two mugs at a time."  
  
The young doctor paused, frowned, then sighed. "There´s a perfect answer to that, and once my brain starts working again, I´ll give it to you." With that he shuffled along.  
  
Amanda shook his head, glancing at Mark. "How´s Steve doing?"  
  
"Pretty much like that. Seemed they met someone at the place last night. But I didn´t understand everything of his mumbling this morning. Something about books."  
  
Amanda was about to give a statement about men and bars, when Mark´s cell phone rang. "Sloan? Steve! How´re you ... Yeah, he´s here. Hold on ... Jesse!"  
  
Amanda eyed him questioningly, but he only shrugged. A second later, Jesse reentered the room, a steaming mug in both hands. "As a doctor you should know that noise, specially yelling causes a lot of invisible damage."  
  
Ignoring the comment, Mark handed him the phone. "It´s Steve. He says it´s important."  
  
Jesse frowned, then took it. "Hey Steve."  
  
"Jesse, I´m at "Moriaty´s"."  
  
" "Mor..."? That´s Shay´s shop. What ..."  
  
"He´s dead."  
  
"What?!"  
  
"Someone shot him." 


	3. Cookie Hell 3

Hi everybody! Welcome to Seamus Zeesley´s death and the aftermath.  
  
Hope, you´re still enjoying it, though the cookie jar´s still not opened ... It will be soon, promise.  
  
Thanks for the reviews.  
  
Disclaimers still the same. Don´t own anything, ´cept the dead guy.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
There was always something awkward about seeing a guy you knew, lying in a puddle of his own blood. And though you always knew he´d had a brain, you never wanted to know how it looked like.  
  
Steve Sloan had seen a lot of dead guys, at least 50 percent of them being shot in the head, but still he hadn´t got used to face a known shot-through head.  
  
He approached Seamus Zeesley´s body, sprawled over a chair in an odd angle, his arms hanging limply over the backrest, the remainings of his head between them.  
  
Blood covered Charles Dicken´s "Christmas Carol" and "Oliver Twist" behind the corpse.  
  
Sloan swalloed once, twice, draw in a deep breath, then continued his way towards the dead shop-owner.  
  
"Who´d ever do something like that?!" an agitated voice next to him suddenly enquired.  
  
Steve jumped, but whirled around in the motion, so that the intruder didn´t notice his tension.  
  
"What´re you doing here?" the detective hissed, still working on regrouping himself. He really needed to work on this jumpiness of his, he decided.  
  
"You called me," the small man next to him answered, innocence on feet.  
  
"Not to come here."  
  
Jesse eyed him questioningly.  
  
"I called you to ..." Steve hushed, feeling slightly embarrassed. "I´m a cop. When I find a dead guy, I call someone. It´s a reflex-thing. That doesn´t mean this someone has to come over. Shouldn´t you be at work?"  
  
"You want a hungover man to treat people?"  
  
Being reminded of his own pounding head only helped in increasing the detective´s anger, but before he could explode in a satisfying way, the doctor, who was standing next to the corpse now, asked: "D´you know who did it yet?"  
  
Steve sighed. "No." He made a careful step forwards. If Jesse could face a dead Shay Zeesley, he could, too.  
  
"I just arrived. I didn´t even ..." He made a pause to bend down a little. " ... see him over yet."  
  
Jess shot him a look. "Oh."  
  
That "oh"´d have been enough to rise up all of Sloan´s anger again at any other time and place, but being eye to dead one with Shay now, realization kicked in too sudden for him to hide it. "He was a nice guy. Huh?"  
  
A simple nod was all he got as a response, but knowing Jesse, he hadn´t expected more.  
  
"So," the doctor asked, feeling somewhat uncomfortable with the situation, "somebody called his wife yet?"  
  
"No. We couldn´t locate her. She´s not at home. Probably at work. You remember what it was she´s doing?"  
  
"Ahm ... Uh-oh. I do." Without further explanations, Jesse stormed out of the shop again. Outside he scanned the crowd, which had naturally began to form around the police block.  
  
It took a while till he saw her.  
  
She was standing next to a group of teenage girls, whose high-pitched voice revealed their excitment about what was going on.  
  
She just stared, didn´t notice them, didn´t notice him approaching her, either. Didn´t response when he spoke to her. Didn´t react, when he touched her shoulder gently. Stared. Blinked. Stared.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley?" Jesse tried once more. Still he got no response.  
  
Gently, he forced the woman´s head to face him, but her gaze drifted away, back to the shop.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley, my name is Jesse Travis. I´m a doctor. Do you understand me?"  
  
Though she´d never shift her gaze, she nodded, ever so slightly.  
  
"Good. Listen to me, you´re in shock. I´m going to drive you to a hospital now so that I can take a look at you there. Okay?"  
  
"My husband´s in there," she said. Her voice was calm and clear, no trembling, just words. Seemingly meaningless.  
  
"I know. I´m sorry."  
  
"You´ll have to take him to the hospital, too. He´s been hurt." Still, she wasn´t looking at him, but at the shop.  
  
Jesse winced, then nodded at her. "Yes. We´ll take Shay, too. My colleague will pick him up later. Don´t worry, we´ll take good care of him."  
  
"I won´t go without him. He´s been hurt."  
  
Fear of having to sedate and carry this woman to CG crawled up the doctor´s back, when Steve left the shop, spotted his friend talking to the palest woman he´d ever seen among the living, and approached them, frowning.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley?" he asked and was greeted with a fierce head-shaking from his friend. The woman continued staring at the shop.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley, I´m ..."  
  
"This," Jesse interrupted him with an irritated glance, "is my colleague. He will take care of Shay. Steve, this is Mrs Zeesley. I´m going to drive her to CG now. Come on," he encouraged her, but she didn´t move.  
  
"I need to see my husband," she said, now lifting her head to look into the doctor´s eyes. "He´s been hurt. I need to make sure he´s okay."  
  
"He´ll be fine," Jesse assured and tried his best to ignore Steve´s stern look. "You´ll see him at the hospital. I ... I promise."  
  
Ever so gentle, he laid his arm around the woman´s shoulders, which had started to tremble now, and led her to his car, slowly, as he would with an old woman.  
  
They had reached the car, when Mrs Zeesley suddenly turned back to the shop again.  
  
Jesse, who´d had opened the door for her, rushed back to her side.  
  
"Come," he ordered her softly. "You´ll need to be treated at the hospital."  
  
"No, I think I´ll stay with Shay. Make sure he´s all right. Wouldn´t wanna leave him here." She smiled at the young doctor friendlyly. "Shay´s my husband."  
  
"I know. We met."  
  
"Ah. Yes. He´s been hurt."  
  
Jesse closed his eyes and draw in a deep breath. This was going to become hell pretty soon, he could feel it getting hotter every second `round here.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley, you really need to be checked over. It won´t take long, I promise. But you have to come with me now."  
  
The next objection was about to come, when Steve, who´d still been in ear- range, stepped closer, calling out: "`kay, Jess, Mr. Zeesley´s off to CG. You can take Mrs Zeesley now."  
  
With that he bowed down to face the woman´s glassy eyes, smiling assuringly. "Don´t worry, you´ll be fine. Jesse´s our best doctor."  
  
Without a further word, the woman turned and entered the car.  
  
"Thanks, pal. A minute more and I´d have to sedate her," Jesse sighed and ran a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking out at all angles.  
  
"Don´t mention it. You okay? You look like you´re in shock yourself," Steve teased with sympathy.  
  
"You´re one to talk," his friend replied, smiling back with the same emotion. At least he wouldn´t be around Shay´s body all day, they both knew.  
  
"See you in the hospital."  
  
"Yeah," Jesse nodded, gazing at the woman in his car. Giving Steve a parting smile, he opened the door to get in, but stopped in midway.  
  
"Steve."  
  
"Yeah?" the detective turned around.  
  
"Ahm ... It can wait." He winked.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Call me when you get to CG. It might be important." With that he entered the car and drove off.  
  
Steve watched the car till it was out of sight, then turned towards "Moriaty´s" again and sighed. Suddenly he wished, the doctor hadn´t left ...  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The drive proved torture for the young doctor, though Mrs Zeesley didn´t say a single word, just started out of the window on her side.  
  
Jesse wondered if it had been the same direction the shop had been when she´d stood outside.  
  
"So tell me about you," he suddenly said, smiling despite his urge to simply stare out of the window himself. "Shay told me you recently moved here. You like LA?"  
  
The woman blinked once ... "Shay." ... twice. "Shay´s been hurt."  
  
Tension got the better of Jesse and he increased their speed against every regulation. If any cop thought he needed to follow them cause of that, he´d have to drive all the way to CG, too, Jess decided, then tried again: "You like LA?"  
  
"He´s been ... shot," she whispered, her eyes darting around now.  
  
Uh-oh ... "Ahm ... ah ... We´re almost there." Just hang on a little longer, please. "Just a few minutes more then we´ll be at Community General and I´ll take a look at you."  
  
"There was blood everywhere and ... Shay ..." Though she was still whispering, the words were coming out with much more force behind them now. Her breathing hastened.  
  
"Almost there, Mrs Zeesley. Hang on." Please don´t get hysterical now. Not in a car. Please.  
  
They were on the driveway to the emergency room now, even there breaking the speed regulation. Nurses better had to watch out before going outside for a smoke that day.  
  
"I saw a man, and, and Shay and ... blood. All this blood and ..." Suddenly her head jerked around, her gaze met his - and she started to scream. "Shay! Seamus!"  
  
"There!" Squeezing brakes made every nurse and doctor whirl around, when the car finally came to a halt.  
  
Within a second, Jesse was out of it, opening the passenger´s door. But when he reached inside, to help her out, she kicked out for him. "No! Let me go! I gotta help him! Let go off me!"  
  
It took what felt like an eternity to get Mrs Zeesley to the ER. She was in hysterics, throwing in everything she had to free herself from Jesse´s grip. Two nurses had to help get her on a gurney and into the building, where she was giving a sedative and fell asleep immediately.  
  
Panting, Jesse stood at her side and rubbed his face. He felt his legs tremble benath him and sat down in a chair next to her bed.  
  
Throughout all his time in the ER, he´d had a lot of hysterical people to observe and train himself on, but either this special case moved him more than he´d been aware of, or he simply wasn´t the right man for this particual part of the job. Whatever reason there was for it, he was an absolute wreck and almost close to tears out of pure exhaustion.  
  
"Hey," a soft voice suddenly said next to him, and he literally fell off his chair.  
  
"Sorry," Mark Sloan apologized, giving the younger man a hand to get back on his feet, "I didn´t mean to startle you."  
  
"`sokay, I´m kinda jumpy." He smiled, and rubbed a hand over his face again.  
  
"Steve called and told me what happened," Mark continued. "I´m sorry."  
  
"Oh, I didn´t actually ... We just met the guy yesterday." He made a pause, then added: "He seemed to be nice, though. Funny." Lifting his gaze to face the other one´s, he smiled again, then bowed his head.  
  
Mark´d seen this gesture a lot of times before. At times Jesse couldn´t or didn´t want to talk about what was going on inside his head.  
  
It was the one of all his smiles the older doctor loathed, because one could almost feel how hard the young man tried to not let anyone see what he was feeling. It hurt Mark each time he saw it on Jesse, and it hurt now, too.  
  
But still, he respected it as he always had, and turned to look at the sleeping patient.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley, I suppose. I heard you had a rough time bringing her here."  
  
"Wasn´t that hard. She freaked out when we got here, so we could treat her pretty soon. I just wanna make sure somebody´s at her side when she wakes up. I understood she and Shay didn´t have any family or friends living in LA. They just moved here."  
  
Mark smiled encouragingly and put a hand on his colleague´s shoulder. "Call me if you need help."  
  
"I won´t. She knows her husband´s dead and she´ll be out of shock, when she wakes up."  
  
Mark frowned. "Why´re you so sure she knows? Steve said you found her outside the shop."  
  
"I think she saw the murder."  
  
  
  
  
  
"You sure?" Steve asked, when the four of them sat in the Doctor´s Lounge an hour later.  
  
They´d had to persuade Jesse to join them, for he´d rather have stayed with Mrs Zeesley in case she woke up. It wasn´t likely for her to wake up within the next hour, though.  
  
"Fairly sure," Jesse replied after a moment´s thought. "Her reaction was ..." He paused. " ... too ... Yes, I´m sure," he finally concluded, avoiding their looks.  
  
Steve frowned. "If you´re right, she must´ve been in the shop when it happened. You can´t see the place where the body´s been found from outside the window. So how comes the killer didn´t shoot her, too?"  
  
There was a short silence, till Jesse noticed every look was on him.  
  
"Oh, you want me to answer this one," he said sarcastically, then looked up the ceiling in thoughts for a second and shrugged. "Hmmm ... Dunno. Next question."  
  
It took him a split-second to bow his head, ashamed. "I´m sorry. I didn´t mean to."  
  
When he looked up again, sheer exhaustion was written on his face, as if dark shadows had dug their way up to the surface of his skin this very moment. "I´m tired. I don´t know why the murderer didn´t see her," he turned to Steve, "but I´m certain she saw him."  
  
After a short while of staring into the air, he slowly got to his feed and headed for the door. "I have a patient to care for. I´ll call you once she wakes up."  
  
The three remaining friends exchanged knowing glances, and sighed simultaniously.  
  
"We should have locked the door," Steve murmured sarcastically, but felt a comforting hand on his shoulder the second he´d said it. He gave his father a grateful smile, nodded and stood to follow his friend outside.  
  
  
  
  
  
"It was a good thing you remembered her being Shay´s business-partner," Steve announced from the door of Mrs Zeesley´s room. "We wouldn´t have found her in time."  
  
"She´d have gone into hysterics some time," Jesse replied without facing the detective. "Someone probably´d notice that."  
  
"That´s what I meant when I said "in time"."  
  
"Thought so."  
  
A short silence followed, before Steve finally stepped into the room to stand behind his friend.  
  
"Come on, Jess, she´s not gonna wake up within the next 50 minutes. You´re not planning on sitting here the entire time, do ya?"  
  
"You think she´ll ever recover?" Jesse asked instead of an answer.  
  
No. "Dunno. Some people do."  
  
"I don´t think she will," the younger man sighed and whirled his chair around to look at Steve. "You didn´t see her in my car. She was ..." His head sank, as if the image drew his gaze to the floor, then lifted again, a humorless smile spreading over his lips. "Next time we´ll lock the door."  
  
Steve smiled and opened his mouth, but didn´t know what to say and closed it again.  
  
An awkward silence settled, the evil twin to the one of the two friends in the bar. This one was thick and foul, seperating them instead of stressing the bond.  
  
The noise of Steve´s cell-phone cut through it like a knive, making each one´s head jerk up.  
  
"Sloan here," Steve said, turning to leave the room, as he always did when he recieved official calls. But he stopped in midway and frowned.  
  
"Yes. Okay, I´ll stay here, just bring him in. `kay, thanks." He tucked his phone away and looked at his friend, who eyed him questioningly.  
  
"They found another body in an alley right next to the shop. A guy named Pinter. Shot himself in the head." His gaze drifted to the still sleeping Mrs Zeesley. "He had a copy of "For Whom the Bell Rings" with him, definately from the shop."  
  
"That could be the killer," Jesse heard himself say, though he hadn´t inteted to.  
  
Steve nodded absent-mindedly. "He shot himself through the book."  
  
  
  
  
  
"Found something?" Steve asked as he entered Amanda´s lab a few hours later. She´d just finished the autopsy on Maron Pinter.  
  
"Nothing you wouldn´t have expected," she replied, drawing the cover back over the dead man´s head. "No doubt about suicide, and of course there was a lot of paper in the wound, too."  
  
Recalling the picture of Pinter´s body when he´d been carried in, Steve couldn´t resist the urge to gulp at this. "Yuck."  
  
"He surely knew his Hemingway," the pathologist said dryly, then continued: "I also found blood on his shirt and hands that doesn´t match his type. I bet once I´ve done the autopsy on your friend, I´ll find out it´s his."  
  
Steve nodded sadly. "Think so, too. Did you find any drugs or medication in his system? Some kind of a hint that he´s had a nervous breakdown?"  
  
"No."  
  
A deep sigh of frustration excaped the detective. "I don´t get this. I checked this guy all the way to his birth and back. Neither did he knew Seamus Zeesley, nor did he ever show any signs of insanity or aggression or whatever. He was a completely normal guy."  
  
Amanda shrugged. "People freak out for many reasons," she stated. "No one can actually point a finger at one special reason. It happens all the time."  
  
"To a museum´s director? With a family? Just like," he snipped his fingers, "that?! No, there´s definately something going on here, and I´ll find out what it is."  
  
Determinded, the police officer headed for the door, but felt a soothing touch his shoulder to hold him back.  
  
"Steve, I know you liked that man, but there is no sense in digging into this. Like I said, things like that happen. No one could have forseen that. Not even you."  
  
"It´s not about that," he shot back angrily, "even if I hadn´t known Shay - it´s my job."  
  
"It was your job to find the murderer, and you did. The case is solved. Leave it alone."  
  
Steve opened his mouth to object, but found that there was nothing to say against this, and dropped his head.  
  
"You´re right. It´s just ..." He sighed, rubbed a hand over his eyes, mumbling: "This sucks. - I´m sorry I yelled at you."  
  
She smiled understandingly.  
  
"`kay, I´m gonna show our witness the picture, so that we can close the file."  
  
"You do that. And then you´ll drive home and get some sleep. - Oh, and when you go see Mrs Zeesley," she added when he´d already reached the door, "send Jesse over here, so that I can talk some sense into him, too."  
  
"He´s still with her?" Steve asked, surprised.  
  
"You two have very much in common," she simply answered, and turned back to her work.  
  
Wondering what that was supposed to mean, the detective left.  
  
  
  
  
  
He stopped in the doorway of Mrs Zeesle´s room and sighed, taking in the scenery in front of him.  
  
The patient was obviously asleep in her bed, her features a little less drawn than they´d been the last time he´d seen her, and her doctor was curled up on his chair, knees stucked under his nose, sound aslepp as well.  
  
Carefull not to wake the patient, Steve approached the chair and reached out for his friend.  
  
"Don´t," a whisper kept him from waking the young man. Surprised, he looked up to find the woman awake and smiling slightly. "He´s only had twenty minutes or so."  
  
Studying his friend a little closer, Steve decided to listen to her and walked to the other side of the bed, where he sat down on another chair next to it.  
  
"Mrs Zeesley," he began, raising his voice just a bit, "my name is Steve Sloan, do you remember me?"  
  
"No," she answered. It surprised the detective how calm she was now, the complete opposite to how she´d behaved in front of the shop.  
  
"But Dr. Travis told me you´d come sooner or later to ask some questions."  
  
"Yes, I´m afraid I have to do that," he said, real sympathy in his voice. "But it doesn´t have to be right now, if you don´t feel up to it."  
  
"It´s okay," she replied and smiled again. She seemed to smile a lot, though it never reached her eyes. It probably never would again. "They gave me sedatives. I probably needed them," she added, obviously embarrassed.  
  
"You were in shock," he tried to comfort her, "which is quite understanding after ..." He hushed himself and looked down. "I´m very sorry, Mrs Zeesley." He suddenly realized he hadn´t said it yet. "I know what a great loss this is for you, and I am sorry."  
  
"Thank you, detective. I´m sorry, too, after all, you probably lost a regular. Dr. Travis told me," she explained as he eyed her questioningly. "Shay was too hungover to tell me this morning - which I believe was your fault."  
  
She smiled again, but it faded soon. "He was cranky because of his head, and I was cranky, because he came home drunk yesterday, and we had an argument ... Stupid one." Tears welled up in her eyes, and she sighed deeply to keep heself from sheding them.  
  
"Then he left to open the shop, I went to buy a knew coffee-machine for it, cause the old one was broken, and ..."  
  
With discomfort Steve noticed her speaking speed up incredibly, and out of a reflex, he tried to soothe her down. "It´s okay, Mrs Zeesley," he interrupted her softly. "It´s all right, you don´t have to tell all this. It´s okay."  
  
She looked up at him blankly, then smiled a smile which made Steve unconsciously glance at his sleeping friend, and swept a hand over her eyes.  
  
"Oh, I´m sorry, detective. I didn´t mean to bother you with all this. I know you´re busy and you have to ask your questions, and I´m getting all whiny here."  
  
Her smile even brightened. "You probably hear stuff like that every day. Please, ask your questions."  
  
It cringed his heart to hear her say this stupid sentence with such obvious ease, but he fought the urge to just hug her and produced a photograph which he´d taken from Maron Pinter´s record in the museum.  
  
"I just have to ask you if this is the man you saw," he told her before letting her look at the picture.  
  
Her reaction couldn´t be misunderstood, and he quickly stashed it in his pocket again. Yet, he heard himself say: "I need you to say yes to make it an offical proof."  
  
She nodded once, twice. It looked as if she had to rock her head to make it slip out.  
  
"Y-yes," it finally came out, a mere whisper. "Yes, that´s him."  
  
He laid a comforting hand on her shoulder and felt it trembling. "That´s all I needed to know. You won´t have to answer any more questions, I promise."  
  
"Did you get him? What´s his name?"  
  
"Maron Pinter. He´s dead, he killed himself right after ... it."  
  
Mrs Zeesley stared right into his eyes. Steve felt as if he´d witnessed every single symptom of shock a human being could show on this single woman. He inwardly braced himself against the question he knew was to follow.  
  
"Why?"  
  
There it was. He shook his head, bowed it, looked up again. He found it hard to stand her gaze. "I don´t know."  
  
"What do you think?" she enquired desperately.  
  
"I think we´ll never know," he said and felt like he´d hit her right in the face. "I know it´s hard to accept. I´m sorry."  
  
"Huh," she laughed softly, her expression changing from pure shock to bitterness. "I guess sometimes people just do this sort of thing."  
  
She was crying now and made no attempt to stop the tears from running down her cheeks. But still there was a smile frozen on her lips. "They just go crazy, don´t they? They walk around, normal people like you and me, and then bang, they just go crazy and shoot somebody. Happens," she sobbed. "Saw it in a movie just yesterday evening. Happens all the time."  
  
"Hey," a soft voice startled Steve, who was about to soothe the crying woman down, and he looked up to find Jesse awake, more or less, and beginning to crawl of his chair.  
  
"Hey," he repeated and handed her a hanky. "It´s okay."  
  
She took the hanky gratefully, and Jesse watched her blow her nose without another word.  
  
He gently stroke her shoulder and shot Steve a glance that send a huge wave of guilt through the poor detective, who couldn´t do anything but stare.  
  
It didn´t take Mrs Zeesley long to get a grip on herself again, and she looked up at the two men - again smiling. "I´m sorry."  
  
"Don´t be," Jesse said assuringly. "There´s nothing to be sorry for."  
  
Her smile cringed skeptically at one side, then a yawn destroyed it.  
  
"You rest now," the doctor suggested. "Okay? Come on, Steve."  
  
The detective nodded. "Yeah, all right. I´m sorry," he told her as he shook her hand goodbye. "I didn´t mean to agitate you like this."  
  
"I know," she assured him and - he almost couldn´t bear to see it - smiled.  
  
Relieved, he left.  
  
Jesse gave her hand a final squeeze. She smiled, but couldn´t betray the expression in her eyes.  
  
He frowned slightly. "Can I leave you alone for a few minutes?"  
  
"Sure," she replied hastily. "Course. I mean, hey, you look terrible, doctor."  
  
He nodded. "Yeah. - I´ll be right back."  
  
With that he left the room.  
  
  
  
"I´m," Steve started the second Jesse joined him on the hallway, "sorry. I know I shouldn´t have said that."  
  
"Huh?" The doctor looked up at his friend.  
  
Frowning, the detective stopped in mid-step. "What you mean, "huh"? Weren´t you going to snap at me for being a rude scoundrel, cause I made that woman cry?"  
  
The doctor sighed. "Steve, this woman saw her husband being shot this morning. You could have told her today´s weather report to make her cry."  
  
He smiled as if ashamed of this comment. "She´s pretty out of it. - I could snap at you for being an idiot, cause you didn´t notice that, if that makes you feel better."  
  
Steve grimaced behind Jesse´s back, but swalloed the reply he had in mind. "You look pretty out of it, too," he stated instead. "Why don´t you go home and get some sleep?"  
  
"Why don´t you? So, you got the killer?"  
  
Steve decided to leave it alone for now and nodded, detective-mode kicking in as he began to fill his friend in on what he´d found out over the past few hours.  
  
"That sucks," Jesse said afterwards.  
  
"That´s what I said."  
  
"People just don´t freak out like that. There has to be ... something. Even if it´s in his childhood or wherever."  
  
"We´re going to check on that," Steve said, "but - it doesn´t really matter, does it?"  
  
There was a short silence, before Jesse let out a deep breath and turned to enter Mrs Zeesley´s room again.  
  
"That sucks," he repeated. 


	4. Cookie Hell 4

Hey! Still in Cookie Hell with me? That´s great, now we´re starting the trip.  
  
Have fun!  
  
  
  
"False is false  
  
True is True  
  
Who is What and Which is Who  
  
No one´s always what they seem to be  
  
Simple as ABC  
  
Simple as One, Two, Three ..."  
  
(Anyone Can Whistle)  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Oh, I´m sorry!"  
  
For the second time within 24 hours, Dr. Jesse Travis fell from a chair. Gasping, he realized he´d fallen asleep next to Mrs Zeesley´s bed once more, and he came to his feet slowly, shook his head to shake off the drowsiness.  
  
He then noticed a small, nervous hand on his upper arm, acompinied by a whispered "I´m so sorry. I didn´t mean to startle ya. Are you hurt?"  
  
Glancing upwards, still more asleep then awake, he met a worried pair of female brown eyes examining him, and smiled.  
  
"Nothing broken, I think," he answered and came to his feet with that hand still lying on his arm.  
  
One look at Mrs Zeesley assured him that she´d been sedated far too strong to wake up by a simple opening of the door.  
  
After two hours of comforting the broken woman, he´d finally ordered another shot for her, and she´d drifted off to sleep in no time afterwards.  
  
He´d also called Dr. Thorman, the house´s psychiatrist to take a look at her the other day.  
  
It´d been all he could do, but still, he hadn´t managed to leave her and had stayed for no reason other than to watch over her artifical sleep till old-fashioned natural one had gotten the better of him.  
  
Now, he led the small, nervous woman, who´d so suddenly waken him, out of the room and gently closed the door behind them.  
  
"I´m so sorry, I hope your patient didn´t wake up, I mixed up the room numbers, I thought this was ..." She hushed himself, studied the floor. "No. Lie. I saw that you´re a doctor and since I couldn´t find someone else, I thought I could ask you. She´s sedated anyway, isn´t she?"  
  
Jesse, who´d shaken his head slightly through her whole explanation as to clear it from the remainings of his dream, couldn´t help but smile at her embarrassed, tiny voice. Now that he was aware enough to actually look at someone, he took in her nervous gestures and her drawn features.  
  
She was in her forties, the first grey strains showed in her short red hair, and there were deep wrinkles surrounding her eyes and mouth. She wasn´t pretty but sort of cute, he found himself stating. Cute like a cartoon cat he´d once seen. And she was small, even much smaller than him, which was a surprisingly pleasing fact.  
  
"Yeah, she didn´t wake up. So - what is it you wanted to ask a doctor, Miss ...?" he asked friendlyly as to take some pressure off her.  
  
"Reddick," she introduced herself, reaching out to grab his hand instead of just offering hers. "Oak Reddick. I´m a psychiatrist."  
  
"Jesse Travis," he said, frowning at his hand being shaken and then let loose. "How can I help you?"  
  
"I´m looking for a patient of mine. I understood he was brought in here this afternoon. His name is Maron Pinter."  
  
She blinked questioningly when his gaze changed at the mention of the name. "D´you know him?"  
  
Jesse frowned. "I didn´t know he had a psychiatrist."  
  
"No, I´m his ... What you mean "had"?" She took one, two steps back, her eyes grew wide. "He´s dead?"  
  
Inwardly kicking himself into another state - another galaxy - Jesse offered her a guiding hand. "Why don´t we sit down in the Doctor´s Lounge to discuss this?"  
  
"Maron´s dead?! But ... but how? He ..." She looked up at him desperately, but realization sinked in soon, till a sort of ... sympathy filled her eyes.  
  
"Something terrible happened. I can see it. There," she mentioned towards his eyes. "Maron did something, didn´t he?"  
  
"We shouldn´t discuss this right here," Jesse repeated.  
  
"No, I wanna know. I´m ... I was his friend. I have a right to know."  
  
"He shot somebody this morning," the young doctor said, and bowed his head before adding: "And then himself. I´m sorry."  
  
Dr, Oak Reddick stared at him, stunned, then muttered: "Bastards!" and turned to leave.  
  
"Wait," Jesse called out after her and caught up to her, while she headed towards the lift. "What you mean? Who? D´you know who could have had something to do with it?"  
  
"Leave me alone."  
  
"No. - Please," he added and grabbed her arm.  
  
She came to a halt, looking up to him fiercly.  
  
"I´m sorry," he stuttered and gave her free. "I didn´t inted to ... The man your friend shot was my friend. Well,", he laughed softly, looking away, "he was about to become my friend. And I´m sure Maron wasn´t a killer, but ... He did it. And I wanna know if you can tell me why."  
  
"If I could tell why my friend shot someone," she replied coldly, "he would not´ve been my friend."  
  
There was an ice cold silence, before Jesse closed his eyes, ashamed of himself. "I´m sorry. I ..." He sighed deeply, and rubbed his face tiredly. "Don´t ... take it personal, please. I´m just tired and ..." He winked. "Doesn´t matter. I just go back in there and ... I´m sorry you lost your friend. I mean that."  
  
She shrugged. Turned around.  
  
The doctor frowned. He suddenly noticed her shivering. Slightly at first, but it increased fastly.  
  
"Dr. Reddick?" he asked, worried now.  
  
She didn´t respond, but a strained sob could be heard. Feeling guilty, Jesse walked around her to face her tears streaming down her cheeks, and not knowing what else to do, he pulled her into a comforting hug, stroking her hair, trying to soothe her down.  
  
He felt as if he had listened to people crying for years. As if people surround him had done nothing else - ever. They saw him - they cried. He was cursed.  
  
Finally, Oak Reddick stopped and stepped away from him, eyeing his shirt with an apologizing look. "Oh god, that´s ... Look at you, I mean, I´m ..." She smiled faintly, wiping the water off her face. "I shouldn´t do things like that. I´m a psychiatrist."  
  
"You´re human," he gently objected. "That makes you a good one, I suppose."  
  
Gratefull, she gave him a warm smile, then rubbed her hands over her skirt as if to clean it. "Thank you. I better be going, I´m ..." She stopped, looked him into the eye, and turned quickly. "Goodbye, Dr. Travis."  
  
"No, wait," he called and came to a stop at her side in the lift. "You´re in no condition to drive. I´d say you´re in no condition to go home actually, but something tells me you won´t listen to that, anyway."  
  
"You´re right about that."  
  
"Then let me drive you home. Please. It´s the least I can do."  
  
She frowned, and smiled. "Why?" Quickly, he opened his mouth to respond, then closed it, and finally said with a very calm and serious voice: "I wanna help someone today."  
  
  
  
"Oak," Jesse read the sign on Dr. Reddick´s door when they were standing on the fron steps.  
  
The owner of the name herself was searching for her keys, but looked up and smiled at his frown.  
  
"Is that your real name?"  
  
"Yeah, it is. My parent´s were prea-hippies, you know. Living in a commune and stuff. My brother´s name is Greylen."  
  
Jesse made a face at this and smiled at Oak´s.  
  
At last, she found the key and opened the door to her apartment. "So - you wanna come in?"  
  
"Ah ..." He was truly taken by surprise. "Ahm ... I ..."  
  
"Calm down. I thought it´d be inpolite not to ask, that´s all. Thanks for guiding me home, Dr. Travis." Again, she took his limp hand and shook it thankfully. "I really apreciate it."  
  
"Uh ... you´re welcome. You sure you´ll be alright?" he heard himself ask. He felt a strange urge to stay as if he was obliged to make sure this woman was not going to suffer. The image of her crying against his shoulder swept through his mind .  
  
But she just smiled. "No, I won´t be alright," she answered, amused. "A friend of mine killed himself. Alright is the very least thing I´ll be for the next few weeks. Then - we´ll see."  
  
Jesse was speechless and therefor decided to stare, which seemed to be an approbiate reaction to her answer.  
  
"I´m a shrink, remember?" she continued teasingly and entered her apartment.  
  
"Ididn´t mean to be ..." the doctor stuttered after he´d found out he still was able to speak after all. Just not able to finish sentences.  
  
"Oh man!" He ran a hand through his messy hair, looking like a little kid who didn´t know the right way to apologize to an adult.  
  
"I´m so sorry. That´s all I´ve done the entire day. Being sorry. I´m sick of being sorry. I wanna ..." He stopped, and hid his face in his hands. "Oh, I´m sorry. I didn´t want to say that. You´ve lost a friend, and I ..."  
  
"Maybe you wanna come in for a minute after all," Oak finally interrupted him. "I´d say we both could use a drink."  
  
After a short pause he nodded, his face still hidden in his hands.  
  
"Is this your brother?" Jesse asked and lifted a framed picture off the desk in Oak Reddick´s living-room.  
  
It showed a man with a determinded look on his face, holding a ping-pong bat, obviously focusing on a component, ready to win the game. The resemblence to his sister could not been overseen, his hair had the same striking color, and his eyes, like hers, reminded Jesse of melted chocolate.  
  
"Yeah, this is Greylen," Oak replied, while trying to bend over the taller man´s shoulders to look at it.  
  
"It´s a very nice picture," he smiled at her, putting the frame back on the desk. "Though somewhat ..."  
  
"Awkward?" she finished and nodded amusedly on his slightly embarrassed look. "I guess it is. But, you see, it shows Grey the way I saw him all my life. He was a fighter. A winner."  
  
His smile faded. " "Was"? He´s not alive anymore?"  
  
"No, no, he is ..." She stopped as if to rethink that. "Well - sort of. He´s in a coma."  
  
Before he could stop himself, the young doctor heard his voice say "I´m sorry" once more, and he winced at it. "Since when?" he added.  
  
"Two years," Oak replied, her gaze never leaving the picture. "He ... was sick. He had schizophrenia."  
  
"Oh. I´m ..." Finally he managed to hush himself and cocked his head to one side. "You don´t slip into coma causa that."  
  
"No. But he ... searched for a cure. He was treated with medication when he was a kid, and he got along quite admirable with his illness." She cast him a glance, smiling. "He became a doctor. Surgeon."  
  
Jess lifted his brows, impressed.  
  
"He wanted to show everybody that he could achieve something," Oak continued, while wandering through the room till she sat down on the sofa.  
  
Jesse remained where he was, feeling as if he´d disturb her tale if he so much as moved.  
  
"Like a "normal" guy, you know. It´d always been very important for him to - achieve something." She turned to face him. "Do you understand that?"  
  
"Yes," he nodded, "I do."  
  
"He always had this ... side-effects,you know. Like dizzyness and cramps, and they got worse when he got older, till he wasn´t able to operate anymore. It was then he went into research to find a cure for his illness."  
  
Jesse frowned. "You can cure schizophrenia."  
  
"No, you can fight the symptoms," Oak objected.  
  
"I see."  
  
"But that wasn´t enough. He searched for a way to beat the illness. With brain-surgery."  
  
"I think I once read an articel about that," Jesse remembered and now sat down on the sofa besides her. "They tested it on monkeys, I think. But it didn´t work out well. There were ..."  
  
"Complications, right. Personality-changes, stuff like that. And ..." her gaze drifted away as if avoiding to look at him, "some monkeys slipped into ..."  
  
" ... coma." It took a few seconds till realization kicked in, but then the doctor´s eyes grew wide. "He was ... operated? Wha ... How? Who´d do that?"  
  
Slowly, as if acompining dramatical film-music, Oak Reddick lifted her head to look right into the doctor´s eyes. A pure moment of truth. And it was over in a heartbeat.  
  
"I don´t know why I´m telling you all this," she said, looking away, even standing up as if to rebuilt the barrier of distance between them. "It´s late, and you really should be going now."  
  
He stood, but stayed where he was, his eyes full with sympathy.  
  
"I lost a patient the other day," he said. "He was a doctor. He tested a new medication on himself. It ... could have worked," he laughed softly, bitterly. "But it killed him instead. Still," he stopped, thought, then finished, looking at her: "it seems kinda brave to me to do such a thing. I guess it´s what people like us should do."  
  
Her gaze dropped. "Please leave now." A tear fell off her face and silently hit the floor. "Go."  
  
"I want to help," he said, though he had no clue how. It was just that he felt desperation crawling through every single nerve in his body, and he couldn´t bear it anymore. Pain and grieve surrounded him like a wall, there had to be a way out.  
  
"Please let me help you."  
  
"It´s not right," she whispered.  
  
He couldn´t make out what she meant, but it didn´t matter, anyway. She was crying again, silent sobs rocking her shoulders, and out of a reflex, he once again pulled her into a hug, to comfort both, her and himself. "Shhh, it´okay," he soothed.  
  
"Grey," she whispered, "it´s not right."  
  
  
  
"Idon´t believe this." Steve Sloan didn´t believe it.  
  
"I ..." He closed his eyes, shook his head, reopened them - but the hallucination (It had to be one!) was still there. "What the hell ...?!"  
  
Once again he´d taken over Jesse´s turn, this time on opening up the bar in the morning, for he´d figured the young doctor would be to tired to think of it this morning.  
  
He´d probably selpt in the hospital, Steve figured, and considering the stress Jesse´d been through the other day, it seemed only fair that the detective took over this one time.  
  
Once again the door had been open, the sign still turned to "close".  
  
Remembering the last incident that had followed such discoveries, Steve had stashed his hands in his pockets, forcing them not to reach for his gun, and entered the bar with a good-humoredly called out: "Morning, Jess!"  
  
But there´d been no response. Well - no verbal response.  
  
Steve felt his chin fall down as he took in the scenery. Jesse Travis sat on a chair at the bar, his upper body resting on top of it. Considering his snoring, he was still alive, though more or less unconscious, for he didn´t even stir when the detective banged the door shut.  
  
"Jesse!" he called out furiously, but still got no response. He shook his head in anger and rushed over to his obviously drunk friend to roughly ruttle him awake.  
  
"Wake up! C´mon!"  
  
"Hmnnn ... hmwha ..." Jesse grunted and slowly turned his head away from Steve to hide it in the blessful darkness of his arm´s crook.  
  
But he´d no chance on getting away with it.  
  
"Wake up!!!" Steve ordered and dragged him from his chair, lifting him in the air by the collar of his shirt.  
  
Being forced into consciousness that way, Jesse´s eyes flew open. "Woah! What ... Steve!"  
  
"Awake now?" Steve asked coldly and gave him another ruttle.  
  
"Yeah, yeah, awake, awake!" Jesse called out hastily. "Let me down!"  
  
"First you´re going to explain ..."  
  
"Let me down! Let me down!" Panic rose in the smaller man´s voice, and his feet started kicking out frantically.  
  
It only took Steve a split second to realize where that panic came from. "Uh ..."  
  
"Please!!!"  
  
Seeing his friens already turning green, Steve loosened his grip on him at once, sending the small doctor to the ground with a low thud, which was followed almost immediately by the unmistakeble sound of a stomach being emptied on the floor.  
  
Stepping away from the wretching Jesse, Steve made a face. "Oh, yuck, Jess! I´m not going to clean that up, you hear me?!"  
  
"Hey!" Jesse shot back, faintly, but firmly nevertheless. "I´d like to see you after being thrown in the air like that! What was that for, anyway?!"  
  
He fell back on his butt now and simply sat there, exhausted, panting, looking up at his partner while whiping his mouth.  
  
"What was that for?!" Steve repeated his question furiously. "You got drunk in the bar and left it open, for Christ´s sake! D´you realize what could have happened?! What the hell drove you to come here last night, anyway?! I thought you were dead on feet!"  
  
"I ..." Jesse started to yell back, but fell silent and frowned. "I don´t remember coming here," he finally said in a normal tone, looking around. "I was with Mrs Zeesley and ... Wow, how did I get here?"  
  
"With your car!" Steve answered. He had no inclination to lay down on the yelling at his friend. "It´s parked outside. - You don´t remember coming here?! Oh, Jess, I ..."  
  
He threw his hands in the air as if that was the only way to express his anger. It seemed to help, though, for he calmed down rapidly afterwards.  
  
"Look, Jess, I know you had a few rough days lately, and I know you´re not good at dealing with rough days, but ..."  
  
Jesse opened his mouth to object but was silenced by a forcefully raised hand.  
  
"But," Steve continued, "if you ever pull a stunt like that again - ever - I´ll ..." He stopped as Jesse´s head sank, his eyes squeezed shut against what was going to follow, and he sighed.  
  
" ... throw you in the air a lot higher than those few meters today" he concluded. "Understood?"  
  
The doctor´s head shot up in a grateful rush - which proved to be a mistake. "Oh gawd ..." the owner of it groaned and clutched it in his hands to stop the waves of pain washing over it.  
  
"I hope your head is killing you enough to never forget this," Steve commented his friend´s painfull look, though he couldn´t hide a slight sent of sympathy in his tone.  
  
"You have no idea," Jesse murmured without letting go off his head. This was without a doubt the worst hangover he´d ever had, he decided. He was seeing stars!  
  
"I feel like the seven dwarfs mistook it a for a mine and now they´re in there, using their tiny axes against my brain."  
  
"Good," Steve said and reached out to help his friend to his feet.  
  
He swayed dangerously, and the detective led him over to a chair to sit down again. There he sat, trying to not move his head an inch.  
  
Steve looked down at him desperately. "Jess, you can´t sit here all day."  
  
"Watch me."  
  
"You´ve to work." That was stupid enough to deserve a slight opening of one eye and even a twisting of his mouth. "Beg your pardon?"  
  
Imagining this pathetic heap of a doctor treating a human being made the detective realize what he´d just suggested and he winced.  
  
"`kay, skip that. But I´m not gonna clean up that ... Jess? Jesse!"  
  
But the doctor was too busy rushing to the toilet to answer. He didn´t make it in time, though.  
  
Listening once again to the sickening sound of a by now empty stomach being forced to produce at least something to spill on the floor, Steve ran a hand through his hair and closed his eyes.  
  
"Jess, sometimes I just hate you, you know that?" 


	5. Cookie Hell 5

Hi there! I´m back!  
  
Thanks for the reviews, you guys are really kind!  
  
More is soon to come. I promise.  
  
Disclaimers still the same.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Okay, where is he?"  
  
Steve Sloan, trained detective, literally winced at the deep, angry voice of his father, and for two seconds, he shrunk to the sice of a five-year- old, thinking about ways to explain his behaving - till it sank in, that it wasn´t him that anger was focused on, but Jesse.  
  
Now free to be the all understanding and protecting elder brother, he blinked inncoently at his father and motioned him to sit down at the bar.  
  
"I sent him home an hour ago," he answered. "Believe me, it was the safest thing to do. He nearly passed out over the dishes."  
  
Mark Sloan cast his (older) son a frustrated look, and shook his head.  
  
"I don´t get this. This is not at all like Jesse. To call in sick cause of a hangover."  
  
"Well," Steve objected, while pouring his father a cup of coffee, "he was sick when I called you. All over the floor, I might add."  
  
But Mark wasn´t up to jokes. Again, he shook his head in paternal disbelief.  
  
Feeling awkwardly reminded of all the times he´d protected his sister against their father´s wrath, Steve placed the steaming cup of coffee in front of the older man and shrugged.  
  
"Everybody´s acting out-of-character sometimes, dad. Today Jesse did. It´s no big deal. And you know he´ll be harder on himself than we both could be."  
  
Since he knew his son was right, but was still far too angry to just let it be, Mark nodded and unconsciously took a sip of his coffee. He didn´t even realize Steve had put it there without being asked for it.  
  
"Still, I´ll have to talk to him about this. It´s not okay to let yourself down like that! Especially not for a doctor. And ..."  
  
"Hey, why´re you yelling at me, I didn´t do it!"  
  
"I´m practicing. You know how hard it is to yell at Jesse."  
  
"Oh. Yeah. Go on."  
  
"Naw," Mark winked. "Now I lost the rythm."  
  
He sighed deeply. "Steve ... This is just because of what happened over the last two days, right? Nothing to... worry about. Right?"  
  
"Right," Steve assured him, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder.  
  
"`sides, he´s an adult, dad. He´s got the right to deal with situations the way he likes it."  
  
Mark frowned, thought about it, frowned again, and finally cast his son a sceptical look.  
  
"Yeah, right," Steve gave in, throwing his hands in the air while turning to look after the ribs, "who am I trying to kid?"  
  
"That´s what I was wondering about, too!" his father called after him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The dwarfs were happy as can be, marching along, humming their joyful tune, torturing their victim all the way to neverneverland and back.  
  
"Please go out of my brain, please!" Jesse whimpered, when there was nothing else left to do, but to whimper.  
  
He´d taken as many pain-killers as could knock-out a grown-up cow, and had sit tight on his sofa for about 45 minutes, squeezing his eyes shut, trying to focus on something other than the throbbing pain in his head.  
  
There was only one thing he hadn´t tried: self-decaptivation.  
  
And he was very much about to try it, when the doorbell sent his agony on a whole new level.  
  
"Coming," he cried out, "please don´t ring again!"  
  
Though it wouldn´t have made a difference to his own calling out, he thought while dragging himself over to the door.  
  
The man in front of it almost yelped in surprise when the door was opened. Jesse followed his gaze towards his finger, which rested on the doorbell.  
  
"I wasn´t about to, I swear!" the guy said, raising his hands as if held at gun-point.  
  
Jesse simply stared. "Hu ... Who are you?"  
  
"Crabtree," the man introduced himself, and hold out his hand. "I´m your new neighbour."  
  
In the abscence of any alternatives, Jesse continued staring at the man, but somehow manged to lift his hand high enough to be shaken.  
  
"Travis," he then murmured. "Jesse Travis. Ahm ... d´you need anything or ...?"  
  
"No," Crabtree laughed out, obviously embarrassed, "no ... I ... it´s ..."  
  
He looked over his shoulder as if to make sure they weren´t spyed on, then bend over to whisper: "It´s my wife Faith. She saw you enter your apartment this afternoon, and she says you looked ill. Therefor she made this", he handed the completely confused man a tubberware-box filled with what smelled like chicken-soup, "and ordered me to give it to you."  
  
Somewhere up there with his dwarfes, Jesse knew he should say "thank you", but he found he couldn´t come up with anything but staring.  
  
"Ah ..." he finally managed.  
  
"She´s crazy, I know. She probably poisened your food, so that she could make you chicken-soup and we´d get to know our new neighbours. She´s ..."  
  
"Seamus!" an angry voice called out, followed by the owner of it, which happened to be a beautiful, dark-haired woman, who came to a halt next to her husband, looking as though she´d hit him right there.  
  
Jesse blinked. "Your name is Seamus?"  
  
"Yeah, why ...?"  
  
"Will you please accept my apologies for my husband," Mrs Crabtree interrupted Seamus, spitting out the last word.  
  
"He can´t be blamed for being the rude - oh, wait, he can!"  
  
And she shot him a look which inclined that he would be blamed for it when they were alone.  
  
The young doctor couldn´t help but chuckle. Images of himself and Susan came to his mind, and he smiled warmly at the couple.  
  
"This is very nice of you, Mrs Crabtree," he said to draw her attention back on him and off her husband who thanked him with a silent look.  
  
"I really appreciate this. I bet your soup´s delicious."  
  
"Oh, it´s nothing," Faith winked. "You looked that horrible, it was my obligation to do something about it."  
  
"Honey, c´mon, Mr. Travis surely wants to have a little rest now, and ..."  
  
"Isn´t your girl-friend in to look after you?" Faith asked, ignoring her husband´s pleas and nudges.  
  
Seamus Crabtree rolled his eyes, Jesse smiled.  
  
Though these people were only a little older than he was, he felt like he´d been visited by his grand-parents.  
  
"I don´t have one," he answered, and his smile even brightened at Mrs Crabtree´s unbelieving frown.  
  
"You can´t be serious," she said at last and looked at her husband as if this was all his fault. "Shay, he doesn´t have a girl-friend."  
  
"You like her?" Seamus pointed towards his wife, but couldn´t offer her to his new neighbour before an elbow connected with his ribs.  
  
"Seamus Crabtree! - He always embarrasses me in front of strangers."  
  
"That´s why she married me," he added, laying one arm around her and placing a gentle kiss on her temple.  
  
"Of course not," she winked and leaned herself against his torso. "It was his money."  
  
By now Jesse laughed, confused, but somewhat drawn towards the comforting warmth the couple seemed to radiate.  
  
"So, Mr. Travis," Faith said and freed herself from her husband´s grip. "Actually we came to invite you for dinner for tomorrow evening. As my husband told you before insulting his loving wife, we just moved here, and we´d be most happy to make some new aquaintances."  
  
"I´d love to," Jesse replied, honestly pleased. "Thanks. And it´s Jesse."  
  
"Faith," she said and reached out to shake his offered hand. "And the village idiot," she pointed over her shoulder.  
  
"We met," Jesse replied, earning one praising and one irritated look.  
  
"You know, honey, I like him, you can go now," Faith joked.  
  
"Oh yeah? Back into the house, woman!" Seamus ordered jokingly, mentioning towards their entry. "Prepare my food!"  
  
"Yes, my lord. - See you tomorrow, Jesse."  
  
"I´m looking forward to it. Bye," he winked.  
  
Faith entered their apartment, and a faint "Mommy!" could be heard, before she closed the door shut.  
  
"That was my son David," Seamus explained at Jesse´s questioning look.  
  
"He´s five years old and is afraid to go back to sleep now, cause he secretly watched "Freddy Krueger" while we were talking to you."  
  
Jesse grinned. "Hey, this guy is scarry. I´ve been afraid of him ever since I saw the first movie."  
  
"Me, too," Shay nodded. "That´s why I´m going to stay here untill ..."  
  
"You can come in now, Shay," Faith interrupted him by opening the door slightly. "I turned the tv off."  
  
"Right there, honey! - See you tomorrow, Jesse."  
  
"Yeah, see ya, Seamus," Jesse smiled and watched the man enter his apartment.  
  
"Call me Shay," he said and closed the door.  
  
The young doctor couldn´t help his smile fading at this. Still he felt strangely better when he was in his apartment again, the steaming box of soup in hands.  
  
"Nice people," he mumbled while placing the box in his fridge (he had no intention of putting anything in his stomach that day).  
  
"Completely nuts, but nice."  
  
He was just about to lay down on the sofa, when the doorbell rang again.  
  
What now?  
  
"I have spoons, you kn ..." he called out, but was hushed down by the frightening figure of Mark Sloan standing in his doorway as if to block a way to flee. " ... ow," he finished, his voice fading, til there was a mere whisper left to queek out:  
  
"Hi Mark."  
  
"Don´t hi-mark-me, Jesse," the older man growled and closed the door behind him. "I´m not here to be hi-marked."  
  
Jesse´s head dropped immediately and he nodded.  
  
Mark opened his mouth to start yelling at the miserable young man, but out came a sigh of frustration.  
  
"Jess, turn around, I can´t yell at you when you look like that."  
  
Jesse didn´t hear him, he was about to do all the work on his own.  
  
"Mark, I´m sorry. Really sorry! I know what I´ve done was completely irresponsible and stupid and dangerous and dumb and ..."  
  
"Yeah, okay," Mark winked, angry at himself for not being able to be mad at the kid.  
  
"You´re right, it was. So - how´s your head?"  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"Looks to me like you´re mad enough at yourself for the two of us, so let´s forget about this. How´s your head?"  
  
"There are dwarfs working in it."  
  
Now he was chuckling! Inwardly shaking his head at himself, Mark nodded in amusement.  
  
"I bet there are."  
  
"Listen, Mark, I´m really sorry. I promise this won´t happen again. Never."  
  
"I know," the older doctor said and was surprised to find out that he was convinced of that.  
  
"I´m just worried about you, Jesse, that´s all. I want to make sure that when you have a problem, you don´t get drunk in BBQ Bob´s, but come to me instead."  
  
"I don´t have a problem," Jesse replied, looking up on his friend in a mixture of awe and gratefulness.  
  
"I don´t even remember why I drove there. I didn´t eat anything over the entire day, you know. Guess it wasn´t that hard to get drunk."  
  
Mark studyied him hard, till Jesse couldn´t stand his gaze anymore and looked down at the floor.  
  
"That´s what I thought," Mark smiled. But tried to look angry again, when Jesse smiled back.  
  
"Don´t smile at me, young man. I´m not done, yet."  
  
"Uh ... sure, sir," Jesse said hastily, eyes down again.  
  
"You´re going to work off the hours you missed on your day off, you understand me?"  
  
"Yeah, sure," Jesse nodded. He´d intended to do that, anyway, and he was pretty sure Mark knew that.  
  
Why am I feeling like a kid being punished by a parent? And why does it feel great? he mused.  
  
"Good." Mark nodded forcefully and cast his young friend another strict look. "And now go to bed, you´ll have to work early tomorrow."  
  
"`kay," Jess mumbled and turned for his bedroom instantly.  
  
Mark watched him enter it with a smile and let himself out.  
  
I still have it in me, he grinned all the way back to his car.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Though the sickness had gone, the dwarfs hadn´t, when Jesse showed up to work the next morning. He´d taken a few pain-killers against them, but felt like they wouldn´t be convinced to leave that easy.  
  
"Okay, you guys, if it´s a fight you want ..."  
  
"Hi Jess."  
  
"Uh ... hi," he spun around to face Amanda´s amused smile. "Amanda! Morning! How are you?"  
  
"Great," she replied, a wicked grin spreading on her lips. "Why are you talking to yourself?"  
  
"I wasn´t ..." he started, but gave in in no time, due to his headache, he supposed.  
  
"I was talking to my dwarfs."  
  
"Your dwarfs," she repeated.  
  
"Yeah, they´re in my head."  
  
"I always knew that."  
  
"No," he tried desperately, "they´re causing my headache, y´know? They´re ..."  
  
"Yeahp, everything you say, Jess," she cut him short, patting a hand against his shoulder.  
  
"I´m gonna go to my lab now and talk to some sane people there. See ya."  
  
"But ..."  
  
He was about to run after he, when he noticed a girl in one of the examination rooms, sitting there on an examination table all alone. His attention being drawn off Amanda accusing him of being crazy immeadiately, he headed for the room and entered with a smile.  
  
"Hiya," he greeted the kid friendlyly.  
  
She couldn´t be older than six or seven. Long blond hair fell freely over her small shoulders, and she presented him with a sweet smile.  
  
"Hi."  
  
"I´m Dr. Travis. What´s your name?"  
  
"Sarah."  
  
"Sarah. Is your mom with you?"  
  
"She´s down the hall to look for a doctor," the girl replied.  
  
She didn´t seem as though she was in pain or seriously ill.  
  
"Well, I´m a doctor," Jesse stated with a smile. "So she can stop looking. What´s your last name?"  
  
"Shem."  
  
"Okay, Sarah, I´ll be right back, I´m just going to tell your mom that you found a doctor on your own, `kay?"  
  
After having earned a happy nod, Jesse left the room to check the hallway, but there was no woman to be seen there.  
  
He decided to let her been called back by the speakers then, and reentered Sarah´s room.  
  
"Have you heard that?" he asked her while sitting down next to the bed. "That will tell your mom to come back here. So - while we wait for her, can you tell me what´s wrong?"  
  
"I fainted."  
  
"Really?" he asked, an alarm-bell starting to ring in his head at this. "When?"  
  
"This morning. I was dressing for kindergarten, and then mommy was there and said we´ve to go the hospital."  
  
"You were dressing?" he asked and gently checked the reaction of her eyes with a light.  
  
"Do you remember seeing stars or feeling sick before you fainted?"  
  
"No." She focused on the light interestedly and touched it once he stopped his examination.  
  
Smiling, he let her play with it and sat back on his chair.  
  
"D´you hit your head lately? Sarah?"  
  
"No," she replied without hesitating.  
  
This was strange. He checked the girl´s pulse to find it normal and steady, and glanced outside the window for her mother. It was about time that she reacted to the announcement.  
  
"Listen, Sarah, I´m going to send a nurse to take some of your blood, while I look for your mom again, `kay? There´ll be someone with you in no time, I promise."  
  
But she didn´t seem to be frightened by the prospects of being left alone in an examination room, anyway.  
  
Deciding that this was definately a strange kid, Jesse left the room, and looked out for a nurse to ask for the blood test, when Mark Sloan approached him, smiling brightly.  
  
"Morning, Jesse. How´re you feeling?"  
  
"Hi Mark. Great. Hey, you´ve seen a woman round here who was searching for someone to take a look at her daughter? No, wait, if you´ve seen her, she would´ve asked you to take a look at her daughter, wouldn´t she?"  
  
"Probably," Mark nodded, though he didn´t have aclue what the young man was rumbling about.  
  
"Jesse - can I help you?"  
  
"Actually, yes," Jesse replied gratefully and mentioned Mark to follow him towards Sarah Shem´s room.  
  
"The patient´s about six years old,and she fain ..."  
  
His voice faded once they´ve reached the room. It was empty.  
  
"I don´t get this," Jesse mumbled as he checked the room quickly before looking up at Mark, who stood in the entry.  
  
"I left her here a minute ago."  
  
"Maybe her mother returned," Mark suggessted, but was met by a sceptical look.  
  
"And left with her? Why´d she do that? I had her called in here over the speakers, she knew I was here."  
  
"Maybe she changed her mind."  
  
"But ..."  
  
"It´s her choice, Jesse. I´m sure she´ll come back if she thinks it necessary. What condition was the girl in?"  
  
"She was fine. That´s why I wanted to ask for your opinion. She said she fainted this morning, but showed no sign of a concussion or illness or whatsoever."  
  
"See. That´s what she probably told her mother when she got back, and they left. Nothing to worry about, I´m sure."  
  
"I left for one minute," Jesse bursted out and ran a hand through his hair.  
  
"They´d have to be ... beamed to get outta here that fast!"  
  
"Jess, calm down. There´s a perfectly sensible explanation for this. Why´re you so agitated about it?"  
  
The young doctor looked at him and let out a deep sigh.  
  
"Dunno. Sorry. Guess, it´s the dwarfs still hammering in my head."  
  
As if to underline this statement, he rubbed a hand over his eyes, squeezing them shut for a second.  
  
Nodding with sympathy, Mark patted his arm fatherly, before he left the room.  
  
"Go get yourself some coffee, Jess. You´re dwarfs will be leaving soon."  
  
"I hope so," Jesse mumbled and followed him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Hi Amanda," Jesse greeted the pathologist when he entered her lab around noon.  
  
"Oh, hey Jesse. How´re your dwarfs?"  
  
"Great," he replied frustradedly, unconsciously lifting a hand to his temple.  
  
"They´re the only workers who´d go on strike for more work!"  
  
"They´ve founded an union yet?"  
  
Joking, he held his ears shut. "Don´t lettem hear this, they might take it as a suggestion."  
  
Amanda laughed at him making a face at the thought, but became serious, when the twinkle in his eyes vanished at his request.  
  
"You have Shay Zeesley´s blood results? I need them to ... marked it "done"," he concluded with a bitter smile.  
  
"Yes, I have them here," she replied, sympathy shown in her voice, and bent over her desk to get them for him.  
  
"I´ve also finished with Maron Pinter, though there is something awkward about ...Jesse?" she asked as she turned and saw him stare out of the window to the hall with a frown on his face.  
  
"Huh?" he asked, startled, and looked back to her. "I´m sorry, Amanda. You were saying...?"  
  
"Is everything allright? You look like you´ve seen a ghost."  
  
"No, I ... D´you know it when you see somebody you remember out of a dream?"  
  
Her worry vanished, and she nodded with mock understanding.  
  
"Oh, like in a déjà-vu, you mean?"  
  
"Yeah, like ... That´s so funny, Amanda."  
  
"Gee, your dwarfs make you grumpy, he?"  
  
"I´m sorry. What was it you said about Pinter?"  
  
"Ahm, nothing," she winked, for she wasn´t even sure herself what she´d found out. Not yet.  
  
"I´ve to run a few more tests on it. How´s Mrs Zeesley?"  
  
"Oh, she´s gone home. I called her this morning, and she seemed fine. Well ... you know, "fine"."  
  
Amanda nodded. Yeah, she knew.  
  
"She´s starting a therapy."  
  
"That´s good."  
  
"Yeah, guess it is," he agreed, his gaze locked with the floor once more.  
  
"I ... uh ... I´ve to go. There´s this severe headache in Two, who needs to be treated, so ... Oh, yeah, the resluts, thanks. See ya."  
  
With that he left, leaving Amanda wondering if he himself was the severe headache who´d take a nap in Two for the next few hours. 


	6. Cookie Hell 6

Hey guys!  
  
Now we´re difinzely on the insane side. Yeah, I knew you were just waiting for that ...  
  
Okay, here´s more. Thank you so much for all the reviews, I´m really glad you like my stuff!  
  
And specail YEAH-double-THANKS to Karen Faye and StrangePenguin (Commercial Break - Music - "Check out Strange Penguin´s new story on the net. It´s great! Obst vor!!!").  
  
Okay, let´s get a look on our cute cookie.  
  
"Grass is green,  
  
Sky is blue,  
  
False is false,  
  
And true is true,  
  
You´ll be you and me  
  
To some degree.  
  
Simple, simple, simple,  
  
Simple as A, B, C,  
  
Simple as One, Two Three ..."  
  
(Anyone can whistle)  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
But there wasn´t much sleep to get in Two, for a bleeding women, lost somewhere deep in hysterics, awaited the tired young doctor, reaching out for him as if he was her last resort.  
  
"Help me!" she screamed. "They´re going to test me again! Don´t let them do this to me again. Please!"  
  
As he shot the young nurse who was trying to hold the patient down while on the same time fumbling with the restraining functions of the bed, she rolled her eyes. "What? Do I look like ET? I´m just trying to tie her down, `kay?"  
  
"Ahm ..."  
  
"Help me or what?" she growled at him and lifted her head, only to be smacked on the cheek by the blindly reaching out patient´s fist. "Ow! Damn!"  
  
"Wait, I´ll ..." Jesse started and managed to get the left hand of the patient and even put the restrain on it. "Shhh," he tried to soothe her down, unsuccessfully, but that was hardly surprising. "`sokay, no one wants to hurt you."  
  
"Oh yeah?" the nurse mumbled. She was still having a hard time forcing the patient´s other hand into the restrain.  
  
Though Jesse shot her a reprimanding glance, he decided to not lecture her in front of the patient.  
  
"I´ll give you a hand there."  
  
"Yeah, that´ll be nice. - Will you stop hitting me, damnit!"  
  
But though the woman wasn´t screaming anymore, it seemed as if she´d chosen to put the by that earned energy into her struggling, which even increased when Jesse got hold of her hand and gently, but firmly put it in the other restrain.  
  
Now that she was completely helpless and tied down, the patient surrendered, her protests now more or less whimpers, her eyes closed.  
  
Panting, Jesse turned to the nurse, who leaned against the wall, holding her brutalised cheek.  
  
"What happened?"  
  
"Hey! It wasn´t my fault!"  
  
"I didn´t say that," he shot back, angry, because it was what he thought, actually.  
  
"But you meant it! Okay - she got here, I tried to clean that wound," she pointed towards the still bleeding gash on the woman´s forehead, "and all of a sudden she starts to scream and thrash around, so I decided to restrain her."  
  
He simply nodded, looking down on his patient. It tore his heart to have to tie a grown-up person to a bed.  
  
It was the most humiliating thing he´d ever seen.  
  
"It wasn´t my fault!" the nurse repeated, now actually shouting at him. She fell silent before his head had even rushed up.  
  
"Sorry," she then mumbled, staring at the floor.  
  
Jesse let a tensed silent estimate, before ordering her in his best business-tone to bring him what he needed for the treatment.  
  
She vanished in a hurry, relieved to leave the room.  
  
The doctor watched her rush off, and sighed. He´d never been good when it came to underline his authority.  
  
Pushing the thought away, he concentrated on his patient.  
  
She was still whimpering softly from time to time, her eyes suqeezed shut as if against bright light, and her muscles tensed when he gently touched her.  
  
"Hi," he said softly to not scare her further. "I´m Dr. Travis. I´m going to suture that gash on your forehead, alright?"  
  
She didn´t react.  
  
"Can you tell me how you got it, Mrs ..."  
  
He looked down on her in expectation, but again, her eyes stayed shut, as did her mouth.  
  
"Okay. Listen, no one is going to hurt you. On the contrary, everybody here wants to help. So, I´m just gonna clean and treat your wound, and when you feel up to talk to me, I´ll listen. And when we´re finished here, you still can tell one of the nurses to give me a call, and I´ll be right back. Deal?"  
  
No response.  
  
"Okay," he nodded.  
  
The nurse returned, Jesse sutured the gash and left the room without earning any sign of concsciousness from the oblivious patient.  
  
He asked Dr. Thorman to take a look at her and headed for the Doctor´s Lounge to get some coffee.  
  
"Hey, how´s it going?" Amanda asked, when he entered the room.  
  
She and Mark were sitting on a table, looking up at the tired figure with unhidden amusement.  
  
"How´re your dwarfs?"  
  
But he wasn´t in the mood for dwarf-jokes and sank down on a chair, feeling absolutely miserable.  
  
"I just had to tie a patient to her bed. It was awful."  
  
He sighed, and swept a hand over his face.  
  
"Why?" Mark asked, his smile fading.  
  
He knew how hard it was to treat a patient that way. Yet another part of the job people never got used to.  
  
Jesse shrugged. "Oh, the usual. She had a gash on her forehead that needed a few stitches, and she simply freaked out. Hit the nurse."  
  
"Have you called Thorman?"  
  
He nodded. "He said he´d come down here within the hour. I´m wondering what it was that made her freak out like that. When you come to the hospital, you expect to be examined and treated, and she obviously knew that she´d to come here because of her inury, yet ..."  
  
He interrupted himself by shaking his head frustratedly.  
  
"What is it these days that everybody´s goin´ nuts?! Pre-christmas?"  
  
"Don´t get all moody about it," Amanda said comfortingly. "You did what you could do for her, the rest is off to another chapter of medicine. And there are other patients you can help, hm?"  
  
Glancing at her, he made a face, not convinced.  
  
"Yeah," Mark joined in, giving the young resident an encouraging smile.  
  
"What about the little girl who fainted? Did she and her mother show up again?"  
  
"Naw," he mumbled.  
  
"See? Then she´s obviously feeling better."  
  
"If so then I had nothing to do with it. She felt fine when I examined her."  
  
"So? You know that there´s at least one little girl out there who´s feeling fine. Enjoy that thought," Mark concluded, knowing that Jesse just had to laugh at this.  
  
He wasn´t disappointed.  
  
"Wow, you sure know how to be grateful for the simple things in life, eh?"  
  
The older doctor shrugged. "It´s what they´re there for."  
  
"Yeah," Jesse nodded, still smiling, though it vanished over the next sentence.  
  
"Still - you should have seen this woman. She seemed ... terrified. Of me," he added with a humorless grin.  
  
"Felt ... awkward."  
  
"Sometimes we have to do awkward things," Amanda said.  
  
"Well, I just hope I don´t have to do that special thing again in many years," Jesse replied, and stood to help himself to a much needed cup of coffee.  
  
"I hated it."  
  
He was surprised to find Mark smiling proudly at this remark. "That´s good, Jesse. Be grateful for this simple thing."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The shift proved to be endless.  
  
After another three hours of non-stop work, Jesse was dead-tired. He was also assuming by that time that his dwarfs lived on pain-killers, for their working speed increased with each pill he took.  
  
He decided to lay down on them then and was just entering the lift to get to the Doctor´s Lounge for another coffee, when he saw her again.  
  
She was standing half-hidden behind a plant, small, standing absolutely still, as if no one could notice her unless she moved.  
  
Frowning, he stepped out of the lift and approached her, smiling slightly.  
  
"Hey," he greeted her, but found that he didn´t know what to say next.  
  
It was strange, but he had the feeling something important had to be said, something important had to be done. Yet, he couldn´t remember what it was.  
  
"I saw you outside the lab today," he finally said, because it was true.  
  
"I had the ... impression that you were ... following me."  
  
She smiled, bowed her head, and looked up again, a little sad, though he couldn´t guess why.  
  
"Do I know you?" he asked when it was clear that she wouldn´t say anthing to defend herself against his accusion.  
  
She shook her head no.  
  
"But you know me, don´t you?"  
  
Nod.  
  
"How?"  
  
Her smile vanished, only the sadness remained, as she bent closer to him, whispering:  
  
"Looking out for you, Jesse Travis. Try to remember that."  
  
With that she stepped aside, heading for the lift.  
  
"Wait," he called after her, but didn´t make any attempt to held her back.  
  
"What ... what´s your name?"  
  
"Oak," she replied. The door closed slowly, she was gone.  
  
Unable to figure out what that was all about, he continued standing next to the plant, confused.  
  
The deep, calm voice of Dr. Thorman finally draw him back to the here and now.  
  
"Dr. Travis. I just finished off the paper-work to hospitalize Mrs Reed."  
  
Starled, Jesse blinked, then frowned questioningly.  
  
"Ah ... sorry. Who?"  
  
"Mrs Reed, your patient," Thorman replied, and smiled.  
  
He was a friendly man and smiled a lot. Jesse sort of liked him, though he kept his distance. He didn´t trust shrinks in general. Never had.  
  
"Oh, yes. How is she?"  
  
"Asleep. We had to sedate her after her last ... outburst. I´m on my way calling her husband. Looks like she´ll be our guest for a little while."  
  
A slight shudder ran along Jesse´s spine at the thought of that poor woman being Thorman´s "guest". The image of her lying on the bed, unable to move, whimpering in fear, swept through his mind.  
  
The smile he presented Thorman with was forced, tensed.  
  
"Don´t give me that kinda look, kid," Thorman said good-humoredly, placing a big, warm hand on the younger man´s shoulder.  
  
"I know exactly what you´re thinking, and believe me, it´s not true."  
  
"Uh ..." Jesse stuttered. For a bizarr second he wondered if psychiatrists could actually read minds.  
  
"This poor woman needs our help, and that´s what we´re going to do: help her. Our jobs are not as different as you think them."  
  
"I don´t ..." Jesse started, but hushed, when he noticed that he was about to lie to the man. He smiled excusingly, feeling like he´d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.  
  
Thorman laughed softly, and took his hand off Jesse´s shoulder to stash it in his pockett.  
  
"People get sick, kid. Physical or otherwise, and it´s our job to help them heal themselfes. That´s what all doctor´s do. The only difference is that whilst you´re touching their bodies, I´m touching their souls."  
  
Jesse felt his mouth twist at that. Maybe he did like the man after all.  
  
"That´s nice," he said honestly.  
  
"It´s true. And I have yet another truth for you, kid," Thorman added after a second´s though. Suddenly he grew very serious, and bent a little down to the smaller man, looking him right into the eye, as he said:  
  
"Everybody gets sick some time. One way or the other."  
  
At Jesse´s confused frown, he lifted himself up again, his smile returning, as he gave the young man a final pat on the shoulder and headed for the lift.  
  
"Think about it."  
  
Again, Jesse stood where he´d been left, confused.  
  
He thought about it.  
  
Surprised, he noticed that it scared him. A lot.  
  
Shaking his head as if to clear it from the shrink´s words, he finally got to the lift himself, ready for another emergency to be cared about. Anythink to distract him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Finally, finally his shift ended. And even though the dwarfs obviously had different working hours than he, he felt slightly better when he drove off CG, heading for "BBQ Bob´s", where the waitress had called in sick the morning, so that he and Steve had to take over her shift.  
  
"Hey Jess," Steve greeted him as he entered the bar, which wasn´t much crowded at this early time in the day.  
  
"How´re you ..." he started to ask, but was cut short by a defensive hand raising up.  
  
"Please. Don´t. Ask. `kay? I´m fine, my dwarfs are fine, everything´s shiny. So why don´t we just skip the "How´re you?"-thing and just sit here enjoying our task of ... What happened to the napkins?"  
  
"I ordered a new color. You like them?" Steve asked proudly while his business-partner studyied a strangely folded blue napkin lying on the bar.  
  
"Ahm ... yeah, sure, but ... You´re doing origami now?" he held up the napkin, smiling in confused amusement.  
  
His friend shrugged. "I was bored."  
  
"So you decided to dog-shape the napkins?"  
  
"It´s a cat."  
  
"Oh. Well, then ... I thought I´d have to wow you, but if this is supposed to be a cat ..."  
  
"Hey! Who´d ever seen a dog with such ears? You wouldn´t know a cat if it threw a mouse into ..."  
  
Laughing, Jesse answered the phone next to him, which had started to ring during Steve´s self-defens.  
  
"BBQ Bob´s - oh, hey, Faith. Yeah, it´s Jesse. How´d you know I´m ... Oh, I see," he grinned wickedly, while his friend studyied him with clear confusion written all over his face.  
  
"Yeah, `kay, I´ll forget. Promise. Ooookay ... See ya."  
  
Still grinning brightly, he put down the phone, then met the questioning look of his friend.  
  
"My new neighbors. They invited me over for today when I met them yesterday evening, and now I know what it will be. Poor Faith just wanted to order something ..."  
  
He giggled at the recall of Faith Crabtree verbally blushing on the phone when she discovered that her guest worked at the place she planned to order the food from.  
  
Steve, though, didn´t join his amusement. He simply continued staring.  
  
"What?" Jesse asked, still laughing. "Steve?"  
  
The detective opened his mouth, closed it. Finally he asked: "Jess ... how ... how did you know ...? The phone didn´t even ring once," he said as if he´d to tell himself. "How did you know somebody was calling?"  
  
"What you mean it didn´t ring?" Jesse asked, his smile changing slightly. "Is something wrong with your ears? It rang five times."  
  
Rolling his eyes, he turned to enter the kitchen, calling back: "Don´t bother, just because I have dwarfs doesn´t mean I´m an easy target now!"  
  
Steve stared after him, then at the phone. Unconsciously scratching his left ear, he shrugged.  
  
He was about to grab his jackett, when his young friend returned from the kitchen, handing him a just folded napkin.  
  
"And this," he stated, "is a cat."  
  
Making a face, the detective studyied the thing, and layed it on the bar next to the dog-shaped one.  
  
"Nooo - it´s a napkin, Jess," he teased. "I´m alyways telling you you´re working too hard."  
  
"Bla, bla, bla."  
  
Hiding a grin, Steve nodded mockingly serious. "Ow - that hurt."  
  
"I´m thinking of a reply, `kay?! Gimme time."  
  
"Don´t bother. I gotta be back at the station."  
  
Grabbing his jackett, he headed for the door. "Oh, hey, Jess, wanna come over to watch the game when you´re done here?"  
  
"Dinner with my neighbors," Jesse replied, letting it sound like a question.  
  
"Ah, right," Steve nodded, hitting his forehead. "Forgot. ´kay, see ya."  
  
"Yeahp." He turned to reenter the kitchen, when he noticed a small girl enter the bar when Steve left it.  
  
The detective almost bumped into her, but didn´t seem to notice as he went along without even turning to look at her.  
  
Because such behaviour was so unlike his friend, Jesse remained, frowning for a second, till something oddly familiar stroke him about the girl, who was by now sitting down on a table, grabbing the card with her small hands.  
  
"Sarah?" the doctor asked, and she lifted her head.  
  
"Hey, I´m Dr. Travis, remember? We met in the hospital this morning."  
  
"Oh. Yeah," she replied and smiled. "I told my mom you were coming back, but she wouldn´t stay."  
  
"So I noticed," he said, returning the smile, but glanced back to the door. "Where´s you mom now?"  
  
"At home."  
  
Again, the alarm prepared to start ringing in Jesse´s head, as he now sat down on the other side of the table.  
  
"You came here alone? Does your mom know you´re here?"  
  
"No. I was hungry," the child stated as if that explained everything.  
  
Jesse couldn´t help but laugh at this, nervously, though.  
  
"What? Wait a moment, you ran away from home?"  
  
"No, stupid," she grinned forbearingly. "I´m just hungry. I´m going back after I´ve eaten. I´d never run away. I´m six years old."  
  
"Ahm ..." the doctor stuttered, finding that he didn´t know what to say.  
  
"Do you work here?" Sarah asked when he didn´t say anything other than "ahm".  
  
"Sort of."  
  
"D´you have milk here?"  
  
"Ah ... sure. I´m going to get you some. Sarah - you want me to call your mom? Tell her you´re here?"  
  
"No, thanks," she replied politely, shaking her head. "Just the milk."  
  
"But I´m sure she´ll worry about you."  
  
"She´s probably still asleep," the child said. "It´s okay."  
  
"`kay."  
  
When he was back in the kitchen, he instantly headed for the phone.  
  
Two minutes later he was trying to keep the woman on ther other side from hanging up on him.  
  
"No, Shem. With an h. Yes. I don´t know! Somewhere near "BBQ Bob´s". - What you mean, there´re no Shems near here? I have a little girl sitting in the other room who claims to have come here on her own. I don´t think she took the bus. - Hey, it´s not my problem, either, but I tend to worry when ... I know you´re busy, cause it´s me who´s keeping you busy at the moment! - No, it´s your job to ... Hello? Damn it!"  
  
Frustrated, he hang up and ran a hand through his hair. He was about to give it another try, when he heard the door fall close outside.  
  
Driven by a sudden feeling, he rushed outside to find Sarah gone.  
  
The only other guest, a young man in a suit, who stood to leave, eyed him with awe.  
  
"Did she leave?" Jesse asked him, while gazing outside the front door. Unsuccessfully, though. There was no sign of the girl.  
  
"Who?" the man asked.  
  
"The little girl," Jesse replied unpatiently. "Who was sitting on the table back there."  
  
The man raised his brows at him, then laughed and stepped outside the door which Jesse still held open.  
  
"Yeah, sure. She left together with the big white rabbit," he mumbled. "Looney toon."  
  
Jesse stared after him, not believing the whole world.  
  
"Has everybody gone crazy?" he asked himself loudly when he closed the door.  
  
Strange, he thought when he was driving home later the evening, he never thought of following the girl.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
One bite of what Faith had tried to prepare herself after the embarrassing incident earlier that day, gave Jesse the idea why she´d wanted to order something in the first place.  
  
"This is really great," he lied, while making a mental note to throw away the chicken-soup still resting in his fridge once he got home.  
  
"Really?" the cook asked gratefully.  
  
"Don´t push him too hard," Seamus said, before Jesse had to answer. "He has no wife, he´s not trained in lieing."  
  
"No, really, it´s great," Jesse hurried to say, fearing a fight, but was surprised by Faith´s amused reaction.  
  
"We don´t want him to stay alone, now, do we?" she asked, smiling like an old woman, wisely, wittyly.  
  
"See? He has to learn how to lie properly. You´d to learn it, too, right?"  
  
"Ahm ... no, I really like this ..."  
  
"Oh, you can stop it now," Faith winked, laying down her own fork and knive, while turning to her little son, who hadn´t touched his plate once.  
  
"David, honey, go get the phone, please."  
  
Obviously this was the magic word. The kid flew off his chair into another room, followed by the echo of his happy cry "Pizza!" as he stormed along to fullfill his important task.  
  
Relieved, Shay shoved his plate away.  
  
"Finally," he sighed, casting Jesse an apologizing look. "I´m sorry we´d to put you through this, but she thought she could make a good impression, you know. As if you hadn´t already met her."  
  
Jesse watched in growing amusement Shay placing a hand on his wife´s, who was definately preparing to shoot back, but was interrupted by her son´s phone-delivery.  
  
Pizza was ordered, to everybody´s clear relief.  
  
"She´s the worst cook in the whole state," Shay told his guest, but corrected himself after a second´s thought. "Skip that - in the whole country."  
  
"Oh yeah, but you should try Shay´s famous ... food," Faith countered. "We´d to move here because our last neighbor did."  
  
Jesse laughed. "I´m not that much of a cook, either," he said comfortingly.  
  
"You´re not?" Faith frowned. "I thought with you working at this place ..."  
  
"Oh. No. I´m ... folding the napkins. - I run it actually, together with a friend of mine. But we don´t work there all the time, we have other jobs. "Real" jobs," he added with a smile.  
  
"Actually I´m a doctor."  
  
"Really?" Faith asked, surprised. "Wow. That´s what I thought you are when I saw you yesterday."  
  
"Ah? Cause I looked ill?"  
  
"Exactly," she grinned.  
  
"Thought so," he grinned back. "What do you two do?"  
  
"Dunno yet," Shay answered. "We had a little shop down in Maine, but Faith wanted to move somewhere warm and nice ..."  
  
"It wasn´t like that," Mrs Crabtree objected, hitting her husband´s arm lightly.  
  
"I just want David to become a Hollywood-star, that´s all," she said seriously.  
  
"Yeah, right, and now we´re here and ... we´ll see. We´ll probably open another shop. Till David can pay the rent. And I´m only good with books actually. There´s hardly anything else we want to do."  
  
Jesse´s laughing subsided noticably at Shay´s last sentences, and he felt a very cold shudder along his spine when he asked:  
  
"Y-you had a book-shop?"  
  
"Yeah," Faith nodded and frowned at his reaction. "What is it, you had bad experiences with books?"  
  
"No, just ..." he started, then out of politness smiled at the joke, before growing serious again. "Wh-what was it called, your shop?"  
  
" "David´s heritage"," the child answered, grinning at his parents, who both nodded proudly.  
  
"That was before Faith decided that he´d become a star," Shay explained. "We´ll have to think of another name next time."  
  
" "Moriaty´s"," Jesse said, but hushed instantly, shocked. He didn´t know why he´d said it in the first place.  
  
"Pardon?" Faith asked.  
  
" "Moriaty´s" is a book-shop across our bar," he told them. "It´s ... I think it´s going to be sold."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"The owner died a few days ago," he replied, looking down. "I don´t think his wife will keep it."  
  
"Wow, that sounds promising," Faith said, taking her husband´s hand.  
  
"Yeah, it does," Shay agreed. "And I like the name, too. Don´t you? "Moriaty´s". Hm. I always liked him better than Holmes, you know."  
  
"I´m not going to call our shop after a bad guy, Seamus. No way. We´re calling it "Shop across BBQ Bob´s", and that´s it. Right, Jess ... Jesse? Are you alright?"  
  
"Huh?" Jesse asked, risen from his thoughts. "I´m sorry, I was ..."  
  
"Pizza!" David´s happy cry interrupted him, followed by the doorbell.  
  
"Dinner´s ready at last," Shay stated happyly as he placed a gentle kiss on his wife´s forehead before heading for the door.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It was late that night when Jesse woke from a stange noise coming from his living-room.  
  
He´d been sound asleep, having spent a few very entertaining, nevertheless exhausting hours at the Crabtree-residence.  
  
He´d listened to Faith and Shay´s loveable and lovingly teasings, and he had brought David to bed, for the child had insisted on him telling him all the names of the bones in a human hand.  
  
"He´s very interested in ... everything," Shay ´d told his young guest when he´d left the kid´s room quietly.  
  
"He sure is in medicine," Jesse´d agreed. "Maybe he´d like to become a doctor one day."  
  
"On TV."  
  
"Hey!" Shay´d hold his hands up in defense at Jesse´s wry look after Faith´s remark.  
  
"Don´t look at me. I´m not going to quarrel with her about the kid´s future."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Survival instinct."  
  
And now, the young doctor was back in his own apartment, again hearing a noise from outside the room.  
  
Still sleepy, he reached for the light and crawled out of bed.  
  
His bedroom door was slightly open as usual. Carefully, he pushed it open a little further - and froze, stunned.  
  
What greeted him in his living-room was the tallest, darkest figure he´d ever seen. Though human it did look, the doctor instantly sensed that it ... wasn´t.  
  
It had no face, a black hole looked back at him; actually it had nothing whatsoever on it that could have led to the assumption, that a man had dressed in black - it was black.  
  
A human-shaped hole.  
  
Unable to move or even breathe, Jesse simply starred at it, terror rushing through his veins.  
  
He knew that he should do something, call for help, try to reach the door, anything, but he couldn´t bring himself to do it.  
  
He could only stare. Unbelieving. Terrified.  
  
It was only when the figure finally made what seemed to be a step, but had more in common with a sliding motion, towards him, that he jerked aside.  
  
A cry of terror escaped him, followed by a sickening thud, when his head collided with the door frame behind him.  
  
Pain exploded in the land of the dwarfs, and their owner slumped down to the ground, unable to break his fall.  
  
Despite his struggling mind, he quickly drifted off to oblivion.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Finally," a familiar voice awaited him on the other side of the darkness. Then, a little closer to his ears: "Jesse? Jesse, can you hear me?"  
  
"Hm," he mumbled softly, his eyes fluttering open with some difficulties.  
  
The throbbing pain in his head sent out orders of ist own, including that his eyes had no permission to open.  
  
"C´mon, Jesse, wake up."  
  
As he finally complied, groaning, lifting a weak, feeble hand towards his eyes to gently squezze them shut again, he decided to listen to the pain´s order in the future.  
  
Bright light stabbed into his brain like little knives, welcomed by the dwarfs, who´d obviously used his abscence of mind to reorganize themselves.  
  
"Woah," he heard the voice again when tried to sit up. "Easy. Quite a bump you got there."  
  
Stars exploded in front of his eyes, when a mercyless hand without any warning touched a sore spot on the back of his head.  
  
He couldn´t help gasp out in pain, his eyes flew open despite their orders, meeting Seamus Crabtree´s astonished gaze.  
  
"Oh, sorry. Did that hurt?"  
  
It took Jesse some time before he managed to squeeze out an answer, which consisted of a lame "yes" instead of what he´d really wanted to yell at Shay.  
  
"Yeah, looks like it does," Shay nodded, reaching out again.  
  
Jesse flinched away.  
  
"Shay! - Where am I?"  
  
"On your sofa," Seamus replied,concern showing in his eyes.  
  
"We heard you scream, and I came over to find your door open. You were lying on the floor, unconscious. What happened?"  
  
"Dunno," Jesse replied, now carefully probing at his bump himself, while he swept his look over his apartment.  
  
"There was a noise and ... someone. I think someone broke in."  
  
"You were attacked?"  
  
"No," Jesse shook his head and moaned once more when recieving pain´s orders to not shake the head.  
  
"No, I ... hit it on the door frame. I think. I ... tried to get away from it, and ..."  
  
"It?" Shay repeated, and frowned. "What you mean?"  
  
"The thing, it ..." Jesse stopped, confused. He clearly saw the black figure in his mind, but it couldn´t be real, could it? He´d hit his head, he shouldn´t trust his memory on this.  
  
"What?"  
  
"It ... didn´t look human, Shay. It was ... dunno. Tall. And ... black."  
  
"Well, Jess, tall ..." Shay teased him gently.  
  
"No, I mean it was really tall. You´d have thought it tall, too!"  
  
"Yeah, sure," Shay soothed, and smiled assuringly.  
  
"Still, you hit your head real hard there. Your mind his playing tricks on you now, don´t you think? I´m sure it was a burglar. Hm?"  
  
"Right," Jesse nodded, rubbing a hand over his face. "You´re right. It probably was."  
  
He winced when his fingers touched another sore spot on his left temble, where even something slightly wet could be felt.  
  
"You´re a little bruised there, too," Shay explained, pushing Jesse´s fingers away from the small wound.  
  
"But nothing serious there. I´m more worried `bout your head. Maybe you´ve a concussion. We should call a doctor or get you to the hospital."  
  
Suddenly dead-tired, probably out of a reflex because someone had said "hospital", Jesse winked.  
  
"I´m a doctor, Shay. And in a few hours I´ll be at the hospital, anyway. `sides I don´t think I have a concussion, just dwarfs, and I´d rather go back to sleep now."  
  
"You sure?"  
  
Smiling, the doctor nodded. "Positive. Thanks for everything, but I´ll better let you go back to sleep, too, now."  
  
"I could stay if you want me to," Shay offered. "Make sure you don´t die in your sleep or stuff."  
  
"Gee, that´s so nice, Shay," Jesse replied dryly, and stood to let his neighbor out. "If I´m starting to feel like dying, I´ll give you a call."  
  
"Yeah, you do that," Shay nodded and stepped outside, but turned once more before Jesse could close the door.  
  
"And you´re really sure about this?"  
  
A tired nod was all he got.  
  
"Okay. But don´t tell Faith I left you in that condition. Or you´ll have to make sure it won´t be me dying ... Get some rest. See you tomorrow."  
  
"Night, Shay."  
  
Alone, Jesse turned and headed back to his bedroom, where he sat down on his bed, head in hands.  
  
"Okay, you dwarfs, I know you hired that guy. You´re all under arrest. Up against the brain wall."  
  
Awaiting their surrender, he fell back, sound asleep, before his head had touched the pillow. 


	7. Cookie Hell 7

Hiya! Yeah, I know, it took me a while this time, but I promise to hurry up now.  
  
This marks the beginning of the real cookie hell, so watch out for dwarfs.  
  
Disclaimers still the same and thanks again to StrangePenguin for her non- stop support and all the growth I experienced through her ... Obst still rules!  
  
Enjoy!  
  
Doctor: "Do you ever wonder wether you´re real?"  
  
Patient: "Oh no, sir! I know I´m not."  
  
( "Anyone Can Whistle")  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Lost deep in thoughts, Amanda strolled along the hallway the next morning, when she suddenly heard Jesse´s voice from somewhere behind the corner.  
  
Though she couldn´t see him yet, she smiled, for he talked in his nice, polite "Leave me alone with this! What the hell should I do about it?!"- tone he used when he was tired, cranky and unnerved, all at the same time.  
  
Coming nearer with each step, a frown built on her forehead. Strange it was - she didn´t hear another voice. Just the young doctor´s making "hm"´s and "yeah"´s as though answering to another one.  
  
Curious, she fastened her speed, only to bump into Jesse when he himself turned around the corner.  
  
"Ow!"  
  
"Yeah, ow!" Amanda nodded, rubbing her aching forehead. "Why don´t you take a look at where you´re going?"  
  
"Why don´t you?" the younger doctor shot back, a clear indication for his extremely bad mood, Amanda decided, surprised.  
  
He didn´t even apologize, which would have been natural for Jesse under normal circumstances.  
  
She was just about to make a remark about that, when he asked grumpily: "You hurt?"  
  
Obviously this had to be enough on a day like this, why ever it should be a bad one for him. She was willing to find out, though.  
  
"No. But you look a bit under the weather today. Dwarfs still at work, I assume?"  
  
Before he could even nod, she grabbed his shoulders to directly look at him. "What´s that?"  
  
Carefully, she brushed his hair aside to discover the slight bruise on his temple he´d tried to hide beneath it.  
  
"Don´t tell me the dwarfs reached the surface."  
  
He waved her hand away and winced when he accidentally touched the sore spot himself.  
  
"Somebody broke into my apartment last night, and ..."  
  
"Oh my ... Jess, you were attacked?"  
  
"No," he hastened to say in a calm, yet somewhat irritated tone. "I hit my head on the door-frame and fell. That´s all, it´s nothing, really. I´m just having a bit of an headache today."  
  
What an understatement! He was having the headache of the year and could have expected a prize for it ...  
  
"Did you call the police?" Amanda asked, still gazing at his temple with clear concern.  
  
For being such a smart-ass when it came to treat self-caused pain like hangovers, she was pity itself when incidents like that happened to her friends.  
  
Jesse felt better by just seeing the worry in her face, and even managed to show her his best boyish smile as he waved again.  
  
"Naw, what would be the point? I think there wasn´t even something missing. It probably scared him off when I fell unconscious, and he ran. My neighbor found me shortly afterwards and made sure I was okay. No big deal, really."  
  
"You sure?"  
  
Grinning, he nodded. "Absolute ..."  
  
Only to be remembered not to nod ...  
  
"Fairly sure," he concluded faintlier than before, but then smiled bravely at her once again worried look while mentioning her to go along.  
  
"What I really need right now is coffee," he said. "You?"  
  
After a moment´s thought about wether or not to keep on worrying, she finally nodded, and they headed side by side to the Doctor´s Lounge.  
  
"Who were you talking to, by the way?" she demanded on their way. "Before I woke your dwarfs?"  
  
"Oh. Don´t worry, they were already up and about," he grinned sarcastically.  
  
"A Mr. ... Something, who was looking for the operation rooms. `nother one of these insurance guys, you know. Some jerk he was, and his voice could have waken up your patients," he added.  
  
Though wondering about that last remark, for she hadn´t heard anything of Mr. Something, Amanda laughed softly, and patted his arm, before she opened the door to the Doctor´s Lounge for him.  
  
"Your insurance covers insurance agents, doesn´t it?"  
  
"It better does or I´ll change it," he replied and approached the coffee machine.  
  
"Great," he sighed when finding it empty.  
  
"Wait. I´ll make ..."  
  
"No! - Uh," he added in a much softlier tone at her surprised gaze. "No offence, Amanda, but your coffee´s usually that weak, it bearly manages to leave the pot. - And ... i-it´s great for staying healthy and stuff, but I´m all over that today, so why don´t you just sit down, and I´ll ..."  
  
Shrinking under her gaze, he turned and took care of the coffee.  
  
"By the way," he said after a short while and sat down across her at a nearby table. "Have you finished the tests on Pinter by now? You never told me if you found anything else."  
  
"I´ve sent some of the samples I took to Boston," Amanda replied seriously. "There´s something in his blood I can´t guess the origin of. It´s no drug, more like the remainings of a capsule, but there were no remainings of whatever you swalloe in a capsule in his blood. Nothing at all, not even pain-killers. It´s strange."  
  
"You think this could have had something to do with him ... you know?"  
  
She shrugged. "Dunno. Possible. Even if it doesn´t, it´s the right thing to check."  
  
"Yeah. Right." He smiled. "Thanks."  
  
"It´s my job," she said softly, but they both knew what they meant.  
  
"I think the coffee´s ready," Amanda said after a few moments of a comfortable silence.  
  
"Uh," Jesse groaned, placing one hand over his face. "Why did I have to sit down in the first place?!"  
  
"D´you want me to get it or do I ruin it by not pouring it strong enough into the cup?" Amanda teased, but was already half way to the her feet to get it.  
  
"Thanks," Jesse murmured gratefully, his hand still covering his face. "You know, I read something by a doctor from Boston the other week. In the july- edition of ... whatever it is we order here. I think it covered something like what you found in Pinter´s ..."  
  
Amanda´s beeper interrupted him, and taking a glance at it, she shrugged, sighed in mock sorry and patted his head gently, before opening the door.  
  
"Gotta go. Looks like you´ll have to help you to your coffee after all. Think you´ll manage that?"  
  
"Not really," he replied whiningly.  
  
"Well, good luck."  
  
Alone, Jesse cast a longing look on the coffee still resting in it´s machine cosyly, then let his head fall down on the table, whimpering.  
  
Life was so unfair today!  
  
"Hey guys!" he announced his dwarfs. "Couldn´t you get the coffee? It´s enough for all of us, you know?"  
  
As if for an answer, the phone rang, much to the benefit of the doctor´s headache. Moaning, Jesse stood, rolling his eyes at the ceiling while reaching for the receiver.  
  
"I almost had them do it," he murmured, then answered the phone.  
  
"Community General, this is Dr. Travis speaking. - Sarah!"  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Dr. Travis!"  
  
Startled, Jesse whirled around from where he´d been about to unlock his car in the hospital´s parking lot.  
  
"Oak?" he asked confusedly, when he noticed the small figure stepping out of the shadows to face him.  
  
"Where´re you going?" she demanded.  
  
"Ahm ... A patient called me to ... Why do you wanna know?" Suddenly feeling like it would be wiser to distrust this woman, he frowned, and made a step towards her. Almost threatening.  
  
"Who are you? Why do you follow me?"  
  
"Looking out for you," she replied calmly.  
  
"You said that before. Why would I need somebody to look out for me? You don´t even know me. Who are you?!"  
  
"Are you afraid of me?" the woman asked, not impressed by his outburst.  
  
Taken aback, he hushed. Stared at her in awe. Yes, he suddenly found himself stating, yes, he was afraid of her. But ... why?  
  
"Don´t become afraid of people, Jesse Travis" Oak said warningly.  
  
"Wait!"  
  
But she turned and vanished into the shadows. When he´d finally found his will to hurry after her, she was gone.  
  
Don´t become afraid of people, her voice echoed in his head, and he shook it as if to clear it. Whatever it was that that was supposed to mean, he would deal with it later. Right now, he had a patient to see.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The little girl sat on the frontsteps of "BBQ Bob´s", awaiting him, looking as calm and quiet as usual.  
  
When she saw him approaching her, she stood, smiled, and sat down again.  
  
"What took you so long?" she greeted him friendlyly, once he´d reached her.  
  
"Hello to you, too," he smiled, looking down on her. "Don´t you wanna go inside?"  
  
"No, I like it here."  
  
"`kay," he shrugged and sat down next to her. "So, why did you call me?"  
  
"It happened again," she said, studying her feet.  
  
"What?" he asked, frowning. "What happened again, Sarah?"  
  
He could almost feel the dwarfs taking their seats near the alarm bell in his head.  
  
"I fainted," she replied. "Like the other day."  
  
"Really? Why didn´t you come to the hospital?"  
  
"Mommy wouldn´t let me. She said it´d go away after a while, like the last time."  
  
Wondering what kind of mother would not have let her child checked out after an incident like that, Jesse bent down to look into the girl´s eyes.  
  
They were bright and clear. Startingly blue, almost grey, like frozen water. He´d never seen eyes like that.  
  
"But you don´t believe her?" he asked gently. "Do you feel ill?"  
  
"No." She shook her head.  
  
"Sarah, why did you call me? D´you want me to call your mother and get you to the hospital? We could run a few tests to find out why you keep on fainting."  
  
"Mommy wouldn´t want that."  
  
"Maybe I could talk to your mom, hm? I´m sure she wants you to be okay, don´t you think?"  
  
She shrugged, then lifted her head to grin at him. "I like you," she stated happyly.  
  
Surprised, Jesse frowned, but smiled back. "Yeah, Sarah, I like you, too, but see, it´s ...Sarah?"  
  
All of a sudden, a shadow flashed over her small features, leaving a shade of terror back there. Her icelike eyes widened in fear, and before the doctor could reach out for her in order to offer some comfort, she jumped to her feet and ran.  
  
"Sarah!" Jesse called after her, stumbling on his way to his feet.  
  
But she´d already crossed the street; it seemed a miracle she hadn´t been run over by a car.  
  
Jesse was about to run after her, when a confused voice behind him let him spun around.  
  
"Ah ... Jess?"  
  
"Steve!" Unvoluntarily, he made a step backwards as if to gather some distance between them. A strange feeling crawled into his veins like adrenalin.  
  
Not noticing his friend´s discomfort, Steve smiled amusedly. "Why´re you sitting outside? You haven´t told this bar-joke again, have you?"  
  
"Wha ... no," Jesse stuttered and gazed back over his shoulder. Sarah had gone.  
  
"I ..." he interrupted himself, casting his business-partner a distrusting look.  
  
Sarah had run when seeing Steve. Why?  
  
"Jesse? You okay?" Steve asked, somewhat concerned, but still obviously amused. "You look like you´ve seen one of your dwarfs outside here."  
  
"Ah ... ha," Jesse laughed nervously. "I ... uh ... I just came here for ..." He glanced at his watch. "Gee, that late! I gotta go back to the hospital, I ..."  
  
A sudden violent rush of panic hit him, and stashing his trembling hands in his pocketts, he slowly stepped away backwards.  
  
"Gotta go," he repeated softly. "See ya."  
  
With that, he turned and hurried away.  
  
He didn´t even hear Steve´s confused reply being called after him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Don´t become afraid of people.  
  
Jesse shook his head against Oak ´s voice in his head, as he stepped out of the lift back in CG.  
  
Don´t become afraid of people. Don´t become afraid of people. Don´t become afraid ...  
  
He had been afraid of Steve. He´d never been afraid of Steve. What the hell was happening?  
  
... afraid of people. Jesse Travis. Afraid of ...  
  
"Jesse!"  
  
Again startled, Jesse whirled around, gasping.  
  
"Mark," he greeted the older doctor, trying to hide his jumpiness. "Hey. What´s up?"  
  
"That´s what I wanted to ask you," Mark replied, and smiled. "Where´ve you been?"  
  
"Uh ... Seeing a patient."  
  
"Someone I know?"  
  
"No, she ... It was the little girl who´s been here yesterday. Sarah Shem. She ... wanted to see me."  
  
"Really?" Mark asked, frowning. "Why?"  
  
Again, a strange sensation of distrust, even fear, got hold of the young doctor, and he stopped in midstep, tensing.  
  
"She needed someone to talk to," he answered and lifted his head to one side, suspicious. "Why´re you asking this, Mark? Don´t you trust me?"  
  
The older man blinked in clear surprise. "Pardon?"  
  
As if he´d heard his own question himself for the first time, Jesse also blinked, and smiled nervously.  
  
"I-I´m sorry, Mark. I didn´t mean to ..." He swept a hand over his face, suddenly feeling very tired. "I don´t feel too good today, you know. My head hurts, and I´m just a little cranky."  
  
Now, anxiety mixed in Mark´s curious gaze, the doctor taking over.  
  
"Your head still hurts?" he asked. "That´s a little weird, don´t you think? Maybe you should have checked yourself. You could have caught something."  
  
Jesse just looked at him, wondering wether or not to tell him about the incident that had led to his headache, but somehow he didn´t want Mark to know. He hadn´t told Steve, either, he suddenly noticed. He didn´t know why, but he had the feeling that they mustn´t know about it.  
  
"No, I don´t think that´ll be necessary," he heard himself reply quietly and was about to add a lie about him having always tended to react to hangovers that way, when a patient was brought in, just in time to save him from lieing to his friend.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Okay, Mr. ...?"  
  
"Dillard," the man replied, and hissed in pain. He held his left arm in a comforting angle, trying to move his hand as little as possible.  
  
Quite a smart idea, considering his bloodied knuckles and a weirdly spread finger ...  
  
"Mr. Dillard," Jesse repeated and smiled at him friendlyly. "I´m Dr.Travis. I´m going to clean the injuries on your knuckles now, and afterwards we´ll deal with the broken finger, `kay?"  
  
A slight nod was all he got for a response.  
  
"Hmm," Jesse made when he got a closer look at Dillard´s hand during the cleaning. "How did you get hurt, sir?"  
  
"Fell," Dillard answered and shot him a nervous look.  
  
Trying to hold the other man´s gaze, Jesse raised his brows. "Several times?" he asked innocently, though he couldn´t hide his disbelief.  
  
"I fell!" Dillard repeated fiercely and jerked his head away from the doctor´s grip, only to cry out in pain.  
  
"I´d suggest not to move it ," Jesse said calmingly, but naturally taken by surprise by the man´s behavior. "I´ll give you something for the pain when we´re finished here, `kay?"  
  
But Dillard didn´t seem to hear him. Afraid, he eased his hand, not willing to let Jesse work on it again.  
  
"Don´t hurt me," he hissed, then added furiously: "I won´t let you hurt me!"  
  
"I´m not going to," Jesse replied, holding out his hands as if to show he wasn´t armed. "I want to help you. I don´t mean any harm, Mr. Dillard."  
  
He made a short pause to let conviction sink in, then gently reached out for Dillard´s hand. "Please - let me continue?"  
  
The man hesitated.  
  
"Of course you can leave whenever you want, sir, but I doubt you´ll do that."  
  
Finally, Dillard nodded slightly and layed his hand back on the table where Jesse had examined it.  
  
"Good," the doctor nodded, smiling. "And if you don´t wanna tell me how it happened," he added after a while, "that´s fine."  
  
Again, he glanced briefly at his patient, before concentrating on his task again. "I´m sure there´s a story behind it."  
  
The man remained silent, his gaze never leaving his hand.  
  
"Must have been one irritating wall, that you´ve had to teach it a lesson like that," Jesse continued innocently.  
  
No answer.  
  
At last, the doctor sighed and decided to give it up. He´d tried, if the man didn´t want help, there was nothing else he could do.  
  
"`kay, I´m going to get a splint for your finger. Be right back. - Don´t go anywhere," he added earnestly when he´d already reached the door.  
  
Dillard wouldn´t look at him.  
  
Outside, Jesse glanced back at him, and sighed. The poor man shifted his weight nervously, his eyes darting around without seeing anything on the ground they were ordered to stare at. He was in an obvious critical condition of mind, seemingly hunted.  
  
Perhaps he should call Dr. Thorman, the doctor thought, but shook off the thought at once. There was no way he would do to Dillard what he´d done to Mrs Reed. There had to be at least one patient of his from time to time, who didn´t end up in a looney bin.  
  
Besides, he couldn´t bear the thought of having to tie down yet another patient. He probably couldn´t have done it if it was necessary.  
  
Suddenly, a noise drew his attention to his right side.  
  
She stood, once more hidden, unnoticed by anyone, behind an empty stratcher, staring over to him in what seemed to be despair. He could even make out something wet glittering on her face when he curiously stepped nearer.  
  
"Oak," he announced her, and broke into a run, when she turned to flee.  
  
"Oak!" he yelled, but stopped abruptly, as he heard a door being closed and footsteps behind him.  
  
"Uh-oh." Whirling around, he only caught a glimpse of Dillard´s sleeve rush around a corner, before there were only hastened footsteps to be heard.  
  
Without thinking, Jesse changed his direction to follow his patient to the stairs.  
  
"Mr. Dillard! Wait!"  
  
Out of the corner of his eye he could see Mark grabbing the phone, probably to call security for help, before he followed Dillard into the stairwell.  
  
Confused as he was, the man ran upway instead of down in order to get out of the building, and had to stop, exhausted, when they both reached the fifth floor. Panting, he sank against the wall, looking at the approaching doctor in terror.  
  
"Don´t come near!" he yelled, still out of breath.  
  
Complying, Jesse slowed down and came to a halt on the last step of the stairs, again raising his hands.  
  
"Easy," he said calmingly. "`sokay, I don´t wanna ..."  
  
"Don´t come near!" Dillard repeated. "Leave me alone!"  
  
"Okay," Jesse assured him. "I´ll stay right here. Alright?"  
  
"I won´t let you hurt me anymore!" Dillard yelled, more furious than afraid this time, as Jesse nervously noticed.  
  
"I never meant to hurt you," he said, trying to sound much calmer than he felt. "I´m really sorry if I did."  
  
"I´m not afraid of you!" With a sickening thud, the man hit his good hand hard against the wall behind him.  
  
Jesse winced. Now he could clearly imagine how the other hand had end up looking like it did.  
  
"I´m not ..." he started, but was cut short, when Dillard suddenly moved towards him. He´d been right, there was no more fear in the man´s eyes, but hot, blazing fury.  
  
Afraid himself now, the doctor took a step backwards, almost stumbling as he did so.  
  
"Mr. Dillard ..."  
  
"I won´t be afraid of you anymore, you hear me!" the man screamed in a high- pitched voice and grabbed Jesse´s collar.  
  
Though he wasn´t taller than the doctor, he stood on the step above him, thereby looking down on his terrified captive, who didn´t dare to struggle out of fear to fall down the stairs.  
  
"I´m sick of being afraid!!!"  
  
Jesse didn´t dare defend himself, he simply stared into the mad bright eyes and begged the security guys to get there soon. He knew that if Dillard decided to let go off him now, he´d fall and probably broke his neck. Still, his heart flew out to the man whose insanity had obviously tortured him over a long time.  
  
Too much to bear it any further. Somehow he had to break free of the terror. If he could only do it without killing me, Jesse thought.  
  
An eternity it seemed, that they stood on top of the stairs, staring at each other, both panting, both out of fear. Then, slowly, the look in Dillard´s eyes changed. He blinked once, twice, cast his gaze away from the doctor he still held firmly in place, then back.  
  
Jesse´s breath stopped for a second, involuntarily he closed his eyes against what was surely to come now - and was roughly shoved forwards onto the floor, breaking his fall with his hands.  
  
Surprised, he turned his head only to see Dillard hurry down the steps, till he couldn´t hear him anymore.  
  
Yet, he didn´t move, but just lay where he was, gasping for air, listening to the fast drums of his heartbeat.  
  
Don´t become afraid of people, Jesse Travis.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Did you get him?" Mark asked him when he finally returned to the ER.  
  
Without looking at his friend, Jesse shook his head. "No, he disappeared before I reached him," he answered.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
By the time his shift was over, he was dead-tired. His headache had even increased over the hours, till he had finally given up and taken a pain- pill. As he´d expected it, that had made things even worse, and now, on his way to the parking lot, he found that he was totally beat.  
  
All he wanted right now was to crawl in his bed and sleep for a century. Forget about Oak and Dillard and all of that, just enjoy plain old sleep.  
  
In expectation of just that, he sighed deeply and opened the door to the level where he´d parked his car.  
  
But the world still was out of mercy, it seemed. What awaited him next to his car made him scream out loudly, and though he tried to fight it, he couldn´t help but freeze in midstep once again.  
  
The dark, huge figure looked at him. He couldn´t see it, but he felt what must have been a glare cast on him, threatening, unhuman. Darkness itself stared at him.  
  
Like the first time he´d seen it, he felt pure, unreasonable terror simultanious to the thought that this was just a guy, not a monster. A human being. Not a thing.  
  
It ... no, no, no, he had waited for him. And wether it was human or not, that fact definitely was enough to rise up the urge to run away in fear.  
  
Deciding in a sencond´s thought, that that was a reasonable thing to do, Jesse turned on his heels, reentered the stairwell and ran down, feeling the dark figure following him.  
  
He´d reached the next floor when he looked back over his shoulder to find it right behind - above - him, and in panic he lost his balance and fell.  
  
Again, darkness overwhelmed him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
He woke to a sensational headache and a deep, soft noise seemingly far away.  
  
The first thing his brain suggested to do was to groan, then open his eyes just a bit. A blurred dark figure leant somewhere over him, mercyfully shielding him from the lights. Still, he felt a sudden wave of terror washing over him when he saw it.  
  
Scared, he jerked away, but stopped in the motion, wincing as pain shot through his head.  
  
"Owww," he moaned and buried his aching head in his hands. A gentle, yet firm hand was placed on his shoulder to keep him from further movement.  
  
"Easy Jess," a deep voice announced when the young doctor flinched again. "Easy, it´s me, Mark. Can you hear me?"  
  
Jesse started to nod, but thought about it and eased his head down again, whispering: "Yeah, I hear you."  
  
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, before opening them again to find his vision focused at last.  
  
"And now I can see you, too," he joked and tried to smile.  
  
But even that hurt.  
  
"What happened?" he asked after another moan, squeezing his eyes shut again. The dwarfs were definitely throwing the party of the year. And unfortunately, he´d been invited.  
  
"We thought you could tell us," another voice as concerned as Mark´s, yet also angry, announced from Jesse´s other side.  
  
"Huh?" the young doctor asked, cracking his eyes open again to face Steve Sloan´s stern look.  
  
"I found you in the stairwell to the parking lot," the detective explained, obviously growing angrier every second now. "You´re covered with bruises. What happened?"  
  
"The parking lot," Jesse whispered to himself as the memory kicked in. Another moan followed. His head was really killing him, and he felt a little nauseatic, too.  
  
"Easy," Mark repeated as Jesse made a feeble attempt to sit up. "You´ve hit your head pretty hard. And adding that to the previous blow you received ..."  
  
" ... which you happened to not have told us about," Steve interrupted his father and stepped closer to look directly at his friend.  
  
"Oh," Jesse said innocently, but avoided returning the gaze. "Ah ... that."  
  
"Yeah, that! Why didn´t you tell me somebody broke into your place last night?"  
  
"I have a concussion?" Jesse tried for an answer.  
  
"This isn´t funny, Jess!" Steve shot back anxiously. "First I meet you outside the bar where you´re acting really strange, then Amanda calls me to ask if I checked your place by now, and when I get here to talk to you about it, I find you lying in the stairwell unconsciously! What do you think I ..."  
  
His voice had risen to an almost yell, but confronted with Jesse´s startled look, he controlled himself, casting his best elder brother-look on his friend as he asked: "Jess, are you in trouble?"  
  
Jesse´s eyes widened in surprise, even more so when he looked to the other side to find the same look Steve had on Mark´s face, too. He couldn´t help his following laugh to be a little nervous, though.  
  
"Wha ... No! I fell down the stairs."  
  
Considering the Sloans´ looks he could have told them he´d been abducted by aliens.  
  
"Really."  
  
Finally, the older Sloan stated, without looking at his son: "The bruises and concussion fit to this explanation."  
  
Unconvinced, the younger Sloan replied: "The burglary doesn´t."  
  
"Guys," Jesse said desperately, for he knew that special Sloan-look he found himself the target of now, all too well. "There´s nothing to worry about, really. I stumbled over my own two feet and fell. You´ve never fallen down the stairs?"  
  
"Why didn´t you tell me about the bulglary?" Steve demanded.  
  
"There was no point in telling you," Jesse replied and tried to smile calmingly. "Nothing was stolen, I didn´t see the guy, and I just hit my head on the door-frame. It could´ve been a dream. You know, I think it was a dream."  
  
Looking at one Sloan after the other, he sighed desperatly. "How can I convince you that everything´s fine?! My head hurts and so I fell down a few steps. That´s all. No big deal. Will you please stop looking like that now?"  
  
While Mark ´s expression softened noticably, Steve still studyied his friend with an unconvinced, stern look.  
  
"You wouldn´t lie to me about this, would you?" he finally asked.  
  
Uh-oh, there it was. "Naw, course not," Jesse lied lamely, his gaze locked with the floor, thereby missing the meaningful one exchanged between father and son above his head.  
  
"Okay," Mark finally broke the silence. He´d sensed his son´s rising anger at their friend and decided to let Jesse deal with whatever it was he tried to hide from them alone. Though he too was worried about the young man, there was no point in making him feel distrusted. Knowing Jesse, Mark assumed that he´d probably turn to him for help sooner or later, anyway.  
  
"You need rest. Let´s get you home."  
  
"Great idea," Jesse agreed relievedly, and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Even in a sitting position, he swayed dangerously and groaned once more in pain.  
  
"Not your home," Steve replied while supporting his friend by taking hold of his shoulder.  
  
"What?!" Against all warnings, Jesse jerked his head up, and nearly passed out again.  
  
Now being supported by two Sloan´s, he couldn´t fight the thought that his painfilled whimpered objection wasn´t all that convincing.  
  
"You´re staying with us, at least tonight," Mark ordered. "And that´s that."  
  
Jesse´d barely opened his mouth, when Steve hushed him down firmly. "No buts, Jesse. And to spare you the why: I don´t believe you, pal. You´ve acted pretty strange lately."  
  
"`sides," Mark added, feeling like the nice cop-counterpart to Steve here, "you have a concussion. You shouldn´t be alone."  
  
Since there obviously wasn´t a thing he could do about it, the young doctor surrendered and let himself being helped to his feet and to Steve´s car.  
  
He slept all the way to the beach house.  
  
  
  
  
  
Great, now he couldn´t sleep.  
  
Rolling to the other side of his bed, Steve Sloan moaned in frustration and hit his blankett.  
  
There were few things he hated as much as not being able to sleep. He was a hard-working man, goddamnit, he had the right to sleep properly at night.  
  
Now he would be cranky and moody in the morning, which would lead to his father making fun of him and his colleagues rolling their eyes at him behind his back.  
  
He was getting angry at the whole world by just imagining all of this ...  
  
And it was all Jesse´s fault, he decided. He was so concerned and irritated by his friend´s behavior, that he couldn´t sleep. It´d be only fair to wake him up, too, and make him finally tell the truth, Steve thought grumpily, but of course didn´t inted to do so.  
  
Though he didn´t believe a word the young doctor had said about the latest incidents, he knew he had no right to push him further. If Jesse didn´t want him to know, that was fine with him. If he wanted to end up breaking his neck, that was fine!  
  
Mumbling a few swears which didn´t make him feel better, though, he rolled to the other side again and sighed.  
  
Go to sleep! he ordered himself, but after a few moments found that he couldn´t obey.  
  
He was just about to scowl at him for showing no respect towards superior´s orders, when he heard a low sound from down the hall.  
  
Unconsciously happy to have found something to do, he sat up in bed and strained to make out what it was. Footsteps. The sound of bare feet trippling as quietly as possible down the stairs.  
  
Knowing that his father wouldn´t tripple, but more or less bang about, for he would believe his son sound asleep by now, Steve combined that it had to be Jesse, who - as he thought in a moment of gloating phantasy - couldn´t sleep, too, because he felt guilty about having lied to his friends.  
  
Without thinking about it, Steve crawled out of bed and grabbed his bathrobe and slippers.  
  
He followed the soft noise to the kitchen and really found Jesse with a glass in his hand, turned to the sink.  
  
Because he had his back to Steve, the detective strained to not startle him and said as softly as he possible could: "Hey Jess. Couldn´t sleep, either?"  
  
Still, the younger man jumped and even let the glass fall down. It crashed to pieces loudly, and the doctor spun around to meet Steve´s apologizing wince.  
  
"Uh ... sorry," the detective said in a small voice. "I didn´t mean ..."  
  
But he stopped in midsentence once he looked in Jesse´s eyes. What met him there wasn´t anger or fright, but terror.  
  
And Steve definitely couldn´t have expected what followed next, for not only did Jesse stare at him in fear, but he also attempted to back away, thereby stepping into the pieces of the glass.  
  
"Jesse, your feet!" Steve called out warningly, but the younger man didn´t listen.  
  
He didn´t even wince, when one piece of glass cut his bare skin, but now slowly started to sink down, too, for he´d found himself trapped between Steve and the sink.  
  
His left hand had already touched another piece, when Steve rushed forward to grab hold of his other arm.  
  
"Jess! What´re you doing?!"  
  
But Jesse didn´t seem to recognise him. Terrified, he continued focusing the taller man, and whispered in fear: "Don´t hurt me. Please."  
  
Shocked, Steve didn´t know what to say, so he decided to deal with the problem at hand by lifting his struggling friend into the air and dragging him out of the mess of pieces to safe ground.  
  
"Let go off me!" Jesse begged, his voice still a mere whisper, his eyes squeezed shut now. "Leave me alone. Please!"  
  
"Jesse, it´s me!" Steve said loudly when he´d sat his friend down again. He reached out for the still struggling doctor´s chin and lifted his head to make him look into his eyes.  
  
Weak attempts of freeing his face from the grib, left the taller man´s arm and shirt bloodied as a cut hand touched them repeatedly.  
  
"Hey! It´s me, Steve! I´m not going to hurt you. Jesse! Snap out of it!"  
  
Finally Jesse´s struggles subsided, his eyes cleared as if a fog had rushed through them, but was now blown away by a fresh wind. Relieved, Steve let go off his chin and sat back to give him space to calm down.  
  
The doctor blinked, and winced. First frowning at Steve´s bloodstrained shirt, he soonly lifted his cut hand to look at it.  
  
"Ow," he finally stated confusedly, and gazed back at his friend. "What ...?"  
  
He interrupted himself and looked around as if seeing the kitchen for the very first time.  
  
"Steve?" he asked shakily and was obviously about to add another question, but didn´t know where to start.  
  
"Yeah," the detective nodded, noticing surprisedly that he panted. "It´s alright, you´re at the beach house. Remember?"  
  
Slowly, the smaller man nodded. He shivered and drew his knees to his nose to slung his arms around his legs, when another drop of blood connected with his trousers.  
  
Gently, Steve grabbed his hand to hold it upright.  
  
"You cut your hand on a piece of glass," he explained for he didn´t know wether Jesse remembered. Looking over his shoulder for a towel, he continued: "I startled you and you let the glass fall down."  
  
He found a towell and gave it to Jesse, who pressed it on the bleeding gash, still confused, but quiet now and no longer afraid of his friend.  
  
"You also cut your foot, I think," the detective said and looked down at the floor, were a slight shade of red marked the way he had carried Jesse.  
  
"But it´s not that deep," he added when catching a glimpse of the cut on Jesse´s foot. "Won´t need stitches."  
  
With that he looked back at the younger man, who´d followed his gaze, but hadn´t said a thing. A fact Steve found extremely disquieting for Jesse usually couldn´t keep himself from stating medical diagnosises. Even more so when they concerened himself.  
  
But right now, he just looked blankly at his hand, his foot, his friend and the mess to this right. Though he seemed to be agitated, he moved slowly, a desperate frown never left his face. Steve started to wonder if he was in shock.  
  
It´d probably be the best to wake his father, he decided, and was about to tell Jesse to remain where he was, when the doctor all of a sudden flinched again, hitting the wall behind his back. To Steve´s shock, his eyes widened once again in terror, staring at a spot behind the detective. His mouth opened in a soundless cry of fear.  
  
But there was nothing there behind his back, Steve found as he turned to look.  
  
"Jesse?" he asked unsurely, almost fearfully. "Jess, what the hell´s wrong with you?"  
  
As to underline his question and because he didn´t know what to do, he grabbed hold of the doctor´s shoulders to gently, but firmly force him to look into his eyes.  
  
"What´re you afraid of? Jesse?"  
  
Jesse blinked. His eyes darted from behind Steve to him and back, suddenly growing even wider than before, though the detective wouldn´t have thought it possible.  
  
He was more or less terrified himself by the time Jesse all of a sudden jumped to his feet, wincing as his injured one connected with the cold floor, and rushed to the back door and outside. There he stopped on the railing of the terrace, gasping for air.  
  
It took Steve a few moments to bring himself to follow him outside, and even there he didn´t dare approach him, but remained behind him, concerned.  
  
Finally, after what seemed to have been an eternity, Jesse turned around, leaning against the railing, and looked at his friend, the remnands on terror still visible in his eyes, though different now.  
  
A different kind of fear.  
  
"S-sorry," he croaked, cleared his throat and tried again. "I-I´m soory, Steve. I ..." He laughed softly, completely humorless. "I guess I ... ahm ... Oh, man, one hell of a nightmare that was," he finally said, not very convincing, but accompanied by a halfhearted grin. "Huh?"  
  
"Nightmare?" Steve repeated doubtfully, now stepping nearer, though he still sensed his friend´s tension. "You had a nightmare?"  
  
As Jesse hastened to nod, Steve frowned. "So what, you sleep-walk?"  
  
"Ah ... no, well ... I must have, right? I mean, I was in the kitchen, so, yeah, guess, I sleep-walk."  
  
"I didn´t know you sleep-walk."  
  
"That´s probably because I´ve never done before," Jesse shot back, his voice rising in anger, but quickly calmed himself down. "I ... uh ... I guess it´s because of the concussion, you know."  
  
"Hm." Steve was definitely not convinced. "You were scared of me," he finally said, sounding almost casually.  
  
"Oh, really?" Jesse laughed nervously. "Well ... ah ... Why would I ... Probably causa the dream, y ´know. Tall dark figure ..." He grinned dryly. "Actually you can be quite scarry."  
  
But Steve wasn´t ready for jokes, not yet. The image of Jesse huddling against the wall was still all too clear in his mind.  
  
"But you ..."  
  
"Look, ah, Steve, my hand´s still bleeding, and ... ahm, I´m kinda ... tired now. Aren´t you?So, why don´t we go inside - or hobble, that is," he added after casting a glance at the few strays of blood marking his way outside, "and go to sleep, huh? I just need your help for ..." He hold out his injured hand.  
  
Deciding that there was no use in discussing the incident in the middle of the night, Steve sighed and finally nodded, surrendering.  
  
"`kay,come in, I´ll go get some bandages."  
  
He could almost feel the sensation of relief washing over his friend, when he turned and reentered the house.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
His hand and feet bandaged, his head still aching, his breath coming out in still terrified little gasps, Jesse lay in his bed, staring at the ceiling.  
  
This couldn´t be happening.  
  
Inside the house there was no noise to be heard, execpt his own breaths, but still, he heard voices talking. Many of them.  
  
He couldn´t understand a thing they said, but he felt that they were talking about him. About him, because he was crazy.  
  
The voices didn´t belong to people, they belonged to his head. He knew that now.  
  
He´d been woken up by them, by the voices, talking really loudly somewhere down in the kitchen, and he´d gone down to see who they were.  
  
But there´d been no one. Just voices. Voices in the kitchen, but no bodies producing them ...  
  
And then - he´d seen Steve, no, not Steve, but the dark, tall figure, and he´d backed away, and ...  
  
He couldn´t help gasping in fear again. He´d been scared of Steve, he knew that now. He´d looked at Steve, but he hadn´t seen his friend, but a threatening, dark, tall figure which had been about to ... grab him and ...  
  
He winced as pain shot through his hand, because he´d squeezed his blankett.  
  
Don´t become afraid of people, Jesse Travis.  
  
But he had been afraid. Like Dillard had been of him, Jesse. And like Dillard Jesse had begged and tried to flee and ... and ...  
  
And then he´d seen her. Behind Steve. Smiling at him. Waving at him.  
  
"Don´t be scared," she´d said in her sweet little-girl voice. "Don´t be scared."  
  
"Sarah," he whispered as the scene was reproduced in his mind. Sarah had been standing right behind Steve, but the detective hadn´t seen her. And how did she come into the house?  
  
With him, was the sickening answer. Sarah had entered the house being carried in his mind. She´d not been there in the kitchen.  
  
She´d never been there.  
  
She wasn´t real.  
  
None of this was. But what was "this"? What was real?  
  
"Oh god," he whispered in fear, and clung to his blankett till his hand hurt again. Even then he wouldn´t let go. The pain was there. It was real.  
  
"Oh god, what´s happening to me?"  
  
He´d never been so afraid in his entire life. 


	8. Cookie Hell 8

Hiya! Yeah, I promised to speed it up a little, didn´t I?  
  
Hope, you´re still enjoying it and thanks for the reviews.  
  
Disclaimers still the same (What a shocker!)  
  
  
  
  
  
And as to my quoting-obligations:  
  
"My fear is my concern."  
  
( Lawrence in "Lawrence of Arabia")  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Where am I?"  
  
He looked around. A white room. A bed, a few feet away on a wall. A window. High above the bed. Sunbeams on the wall, but dark it was, that room, dark and cold.  
  
He shivered.  
  
"We want to help you, Jesse," a deep, calming voice answered.  
  
He wasn´t alone. Mark, Steve and Amanda were standing next to the bed, focusing him.  
  
And there were his parents, too. Far away, in the distance, they stood, seemingly small. The room had widened.  
  
"I don´t need help," he replied.  
  
"Your son," he heard his mother´s voice over a loudspeaker.  
  
Suddenly, Mark Sloan at his side. A firm hand on his shoulder.  
  
"You are sick, Jesse."  
  
Though he tried to, Jesse couldn´t meet his gaze. Like there was nothing to be met. Way up above his head.  
  
"You think that I´m crazy!"  
  
"Well, in this case," Mark said casually, "sick is crazy, my friend."  
  
As everybody in the room except Jesse laughed, the older doctor produced a syringe.  
  
Jesse´s eyes widened in fear. Steve now attempted to approach the smaller man.  
  
Amanda had vanished.  
  
"No!" Jesse screamed and ran. The door was locked.  
  
"Don´t come near me!"  
  
"You´re afraid, Jesse Travis."  
  
At the sudden sound of Oak´s voice, Jesse spun around. She was standing a little distanced to Mark, blocking the way to his parents. Dwarfs were pacing behind her, humming a tune he knew from his childhood.  
  
"Yes, I am afraid," he shouted at her, and when he looked back, Steve had already gotten hold of his arms to drag him to the bed.  
  
"Let go off me!" Jesse cried in terror, but his struggles remained uncuccessfully. With unbelievable ease Steve forced the smaller man´s hands into the restrains on the bed, till Jesse couldn´t move an inch.  
  
"No!" he protested, but was hushed down by Mark, who came nearer, the syringe till in hands, prepared to use it on the terrified patient.  
  
"Shh, Jesse," he soothed, "be gratefull for the simple things in life. This won´t hurt a bit, for example."  
  
"No, don´t! You can´t do ..."  
  
"Hush, stupid," Sarah Shem whispered right into his ear. "You´ll wake `em all up."  
  
  
  
  
  
With a jerk, Jesse found himself upright in bed, panting heavily, still being hold tight by the shock of his dream.  
  
He could feel his heart trying to break out of his shivering body, and his hands were cramped around the blanket. Sleep was still having the better of him then consciousness, but his wide eyes were focusing now, on the darkness in which shillouettes seemed to move.  
  
As his head cleared slowly, he found the origin of some vague, throbbing pain in his hand, and staring at a small bloodied spot on the bandage, he recalled the incident that had let to his injury.  
  
At last that hadn´t been a dream, he thought wryly. And his sly smile grew even more bitter, since he could make out a small figure in the darkness now, waving slightly at him, before turning to leave the room.  
  
He strained to listen to Sarah´s footsteps on the stairs, but stopped himself in fury. There were no footsteps. He was listening to his own hallucination.  
  
Roughly, he put his hands onto his ears, ignoring the pain it caused. His blood roared in his ears; he closed his eyes to concentrate on that. It was real. He was real.  
  
Like in a movie, all the places where he´d seen Sarah showed in his mind. He recalled her sudden disappearance at the hospital and how Steve had almost bumped into her at "BBQ Bob´s". The other time she´d run away from Steve. She´d been afraid of him, it had seemed.  
  
Now Jesse knew why. Steve hadn´t seen her. She´d probably been afraid of being found out an hallucination.  
  
"Awww, come on!" he whispered to himself and fell back on the bed, taking his hands off his ears. "She doesn´t want to be found out ... That´s crazy, Dr. Travis!"  
  
He laughed faintly at himself, but stopped once his words sank in properly. Actually, it was crazy. It was about as crazy as a person could get.  
  
Could get? Could be! How long did he have this? How many people he knew where ... like Sarah?  
  
In panic, he tried to recall every man or woman he´d ever talked to alone, without any of his friends knowing him or her. His friends ... No, that couldn´t ...  
  
He jumped out of bed - he just had to move - and stood there, staring back at where he´d lay, again gasping in fear.  
  
"This isn´t happening!" he told himself.  
  
He was about to add another reassuring thing to say, but suddenly found himself dressing in a hurry, his fearful gaze never leaving the bed. Glimpses of his dream travelled through his mind, mixing with reality in there.  
  
"Don´t become afraid of people," Oak had told him.  
  
But what could you do when your friends would lock you up in a looney bin once they found out who you really were? What could you do if they tied you down like Mrs Reed once they would have found out? What could be more frightening than ... people?  
  
There was nothing he had to be afraid of but people!  
  
And nothing that could save him but fear.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It took a while till he finally reached his building. Eventually a cab drove by and even stopped for him to enter. Exhausted, Jesse almost fell asleep in the car. He would never have imagined it to be that arduous to creep outside a house. Back home in his last highschool days, he´d been used to it, but then he´d never been really afraid of his mother ...  
  
Now he was safe, home, away from his friends,who suddenly seemed the most dangerous people in the world just because they knew him. Those who knew him would find out eventually. And he couldn´t let that happen.  
  
So though relieved enough to finally control his trembling hands, he was still tensed and agitated when he unlocked the door to his apartment.  
  
Where to go?  
  
What to do?  
  
"Jesse! Finally!"  
  
He jumped that high, he´d probably hit the ceiling if he´d been tall enough.  
  
"Shay!" he stated shakily, once he was able to again. "Faith! Wha ...?"  
  
"We were worried about you," Faith answered, and stood to approach and hug him in a greeting gesture. "Where´ve you been?"  
  
"I ..." He couldn´t find the words. Again, as so often in the last days, he could only stare. This was becoming one irritating habit.  
  
"Wow, what happened?" Seamus Crabtree asked. He, too, had come nearer now, and noticed a bruise from the fall on Jesse´s face. In the meantime, Faith had closed the door and gently shoved the confused doctor towards the sofa.  
  
"I ... What ... What´re you doing here?" Jesse managed to demand at last. He was beginning to feel very, very pissed with the situation. "How did you get in?"  
  
"We were worried," Faith replied, and frowned. "Sorry for caring about you!"  
  
"Worried!" Jesse sneered.  
  
"Yes," Shay nodded. "You didn´t come home all night. You see, we waited, because we wanted to talk to you about this shop you know."  
  
"Yeah," Faith agreed and went to stand next to her husband. " "Moriaty´s"."  
  
It was so clear. He should have seen it before.  
  
"Mori ...," he repeated in a chocked whisper. His feet stepped back, slowly, his tongue swallowed dryly ... He knew, but his body reacted delayedly.  
  
"Jesse, you okay?" Shay asked and exchanged a concerned gaze with his wife. "You look like you´ve seen a ..."  
  
"Ghost," Jesse concluded with a grim smile. "A ghost, Shay?"  
  
"Jess, what´s wrong?" Faith asked, fear in her voice.  
  
"You ..." A short nervous laugh escaped him. "You´re ... not real. You´re like her."  
  
"Jesse?"  
  
"You´re not real," he repeated, convinced. "Are you?"  
  
Unimpressed, Faith sat down on the sofa, the look she presented him with was calm, as if she was about to talk to a child.  
  
"What do you think?" she asked friendlyly.  
  
He draw in a deep breath. "I think you are not real. You are here, because I see you. Actually, I´m talking to pure air this moment."  
  
"So?" Shay asked and sat down next to his wife. "Pure air, huh? But still you´re talking to us, aren´t you?"  
  
"But you´re just a hallucination!"  
  
"So?"  
  
" "So"?! I´m crazy!"  
  
"Well, that´s hardly news," Faith teased.  
  
"This is not funny!!!" Jesse shouted at her, but turned away in a hurry a second later. "Oh my, now I´m arguing with a hallucination! Why is it even someone who´s not there makes fun of me?!"  
  
"Jesse," Shay said comfortingly, "look at me."  
  
Desperate, the doctor obeyed. Since he was seeing this guy, why not listen to him?  
  
"You´re crazy," Shay said. "No doubt about that, but ..."  
  
"Oh great, the white rabbit tells me I´m crazy. I´m lost, oh, scratch that, I´m all over lost - I´m dead."  
  
"But," Shay continued, ignoring Jesse´s frustrated outburst, "I don´t get how that makes us unreal."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"He´s right, you know," Faith cut in. "Why do we have to be unreal, just because you are crazy? Don´t you think that a little ... arrogant?"  
  
"Huh?!"  
  
"What makes you so damn certain that you´re real?" Faith demanded provokingly.  
  
There was a short, unbelieving silence, before the young doctor threw his hands in the air.  
  
"What?! Are you crazy?! I. Am. Not. Unreal! You get that? You´re Harveys, not me!"  
  
"But you´re crazy," Shay pointed out.  
  
"And you´re unreal! Seems to me neither of us is very convincing on this point."  
  
"Actually, we both are," Faith disagreed. "See, Jesse, what makes you think you´re a real person?"  
  
"That´s a crazy question, Faith! What ..."  
  
"You´re one to talk."  
  
"Okay, fine! I have parents! I have a job! I have a life! I even had a girl- friend once! I have friends! And - most importantly - I have hallucinations! Guess, that makes me very real!"  
  
"There´s no need to yell at me."  
  
"Oh yeah? I figured that if I yell loud enough you may go out of my head!!!"  
  
"Oh great, doctor," Faith growled, "keep on the shouting to wake up the whole building and make them take you to a nice, white place where ..."  
  
"Don´t listen to her," Shay interrupted his wife, "she´s not real."  
  
Resigning, Jesse let his head fall down into his hands. "Oh gawd," he moaned, "this can´t be happning! Why do I have to get hallucinations who think they´re funny?!"  
  
"Jess, listen," Shay tried again. "Faith is right. You said you´re real, because you have friends and parents and so on. People, in short. You have people who know you and that makes you real, right?"  
  
"Hm-hm."  
  
"So? You see us. You hear us. You can even," he placed a comforting hand on Jesse´s shoulder, "feel us."  
  
Doubtfull, Jesse lifted his head to look at the man. "Your point being?"  
  
"Why do all these facts make you a real person, but not us?"  
  
Silence.  
  
"Good point," Jesse admitted, adding after a moment´s thought: "I didn´t know I could be that clever. And since you´re my hallucinaton, it must be me who´s figured this out, eh?"  
  
"Then why don´t you believe yourself?"  
  
"Hm ... Cause I´m ... insane?"  
  
"No, Jesse," Faith objected. She also stood, again walking to her husband´s side, and smiled at her producer. "You´re just afraid."  
  
There was no denying that, so he remained silent.  
  
"Don´t be," Faith contined and reached out to softly stroke his cheek. "What´s there to be afraid of? We´re nice people, aren´t we? We won´t do you any harm. We´ll just come visit you from time to time. Invite you over for dinner," she grinned as Shay shuddered at the thought of her food.  
  
"We´re your friends, Jesse. Doesn´t that make us pretty real?"  
  
Surprised, the doctor found his fear had gone. The doubts had gone. The smile he felt on his lips was honest and clear, bright and happy.  
  
"Yeah," he answered calmly. "Yeah, I guess it does."  
  
Proudly, Shay nudged his friend´s shoulder, grinning. "Now that wasn´t so hard, was it? You know, Faith, we should be going. The poor man needs sleep. Finding out about the own insanity tends to exhaust one, you know."  
  
Faith laughed, placed a gentle kiss on Jesse´s cheek and left the house, followed by her husband, who waved at the doctor good-humoredly.  
  
"See ya, pal."  
  
"In my mind," Jesse replied, and smiled at the awkward thought.  
  
Shay shrugged, before closing the door behind him. "Been there, done that, got the T-shirt."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
For the first time ever, Jesse walked to the hospital. Well, he started to, anyway. Since it´d take him one and a half hour to get there by foot, he´d evetually grab a cab on the way, he figured.  
  
Yet, he actually enjoyed the exercise. It was doing him good, he had to think about nothing else but placing one foot after the other, and the air was clearing ...  
  
... his lungs, he laughed after a chocking fit was finally gone. `kay, it wasn´t the cleanest air on earth, but it was the air of his city. His life, which he loved. And he´d never allow it to be taken away from him.  
  
Not even by his own mental condition.  
  
A triumphant grin spread on his face, now that he´d made a final decision. He would have to work on it, sure, but then life never was easy. One always had to struggle for it to be good, and he was willing to keep up doing so.  
  
Therefor he had to make a plan, work out strategies. He had no idea how long this had been going on unnoticedly. Maybe he´d been insane all his life. Maybe he never had this friend named Bobby in forth grade. He´d never introduced him to his parents ...  
  
But maybe something had just gone wrong lately. Up there inside his head. Maybe the illness had been waiting to show itself.  
  
However, there was no point in guessing around, now that he´d found out, he had to live with it. And he would.  
  
His friends hadn´t found out yet, he was sure about that. Steve was a little worried, okay, but it was most unlikely that he would think his friend to be a lunatic.  
  
Actually, all his friends would have a hard time believing that. Maybe it would be easier than he thought ...  
  
"Dr. Travis."  
  
"Oak!" he greeted the small woman who approached him from the other side of the road. But then he frowned. Oak. When had he seen Oak over the last few days? In the parking lot. In the hospital. Alone.  
  
And what kind of a name was Oak?  
  
"You´re walking to the hospital?" she asked casually while joining him.  
  
"Yeah, I have some thinking to do," he answered innocently.  
  
"So?"  
  
"Yes. About ... you actually."  
  
"Me?" A sudden shadow settled on her face. "Why me?"  
  
"I wonder wether you´re real, you know."  
  
"Oh?" She smiled grimly. "Do women really fall for that line?"  
  
"See, there´s the humor. All of you people have that. Shouldn´t be surprised, then, should I? I mean, hey, I´m a witty guy."  
  
"You don´t think I´m real?"she asked and stopped.  
  
"Convince me otherwise."  
  
"Why would I?"  
  
"The others didn´t like to be called unreal." He shrugged. "But maybe I´m accepting it now."  
  
"You are?" Oak demanded interestedly, and made a step forward to look into his eyes. "Yes, maybe you really are."  
  
"Oh, and you´re probably glad to hear that I´m not afraid anymore," he grinned.  
  
The slight smile on her lips faded, she stepped back again.  
  
"You´ve not been afraid, yet, Jesse." Carefully, she reached out to touch his temple. "Maybe you shouldn´t accept it."  
  
He frowned, feeling a well-known shade of fear crawling down his spine, but before he could ask her what that was supposed to mean, she turned and ran.  
  
A few moments he stared after her, then shrugged and continued his walk.  
  
"There have to be inpolite Harveys, too, I guess."  
  
  
  
  
  
Crazy or not, Jesse Travis definitely still knew himself, he stated amusedly when he was sitting in a cab half an hour later.  
  
Besides, everything he´d wanted to figure out while hiking through town, he´d figured out. There was no way he´d walk an inch more than he had to.  
  
He wasn´t that much of a walker, he´d to admit.  
  
"Lazy," a high voice next to him suddenly announced.  
  
But maybe it was because of him getting used to it, that he didn´t jump, but simply turned his head to meet the little girl´s teasing smile.  
  
"You´re one to talk," he said, not caring if the driver heard him. He was after all a cab driver in LA - he´d probably been shocked if his passenger wasn´t talking to himself ...  
  
"I´m driving to work, you´re just driving around. `sides, you´ll never have to grow up, anyway."  
  
The girl shrugged. "I like it," she said, then smiled brightly and sweetly at him. "Thanks for letting me in."  
  
"Oh, did I?"  
  
She nodded earnestly.  
  
"Well, then, you´re welcome, I suppose."  
  
Grinning, she placed a small hand on his bandaged one. It didn´t hurt, actually, it felt good, as if easing some of the pain away.  
  
"I like you," she stated as she had before at "BBQ Bob´s."  
  
This time, his smile was honest. "You know what, Sarah Shem? I like you, too. D´you want me to take you some place in particular?"  
  
Softly, she shook her head. "No."  
  
"Didn´t think so."  
  
They drove on in silence, and after a short while, he put a hand on her head to stroke her hair. It felt soft and real.  
  
"ER, sir?" the driver asked. He´d paid no attention towards the man´s dialoge with himself.  
  
"Oh, here already? Yeah, I just get out here. Thanks."  
  
Searching for his money, Jesse took his hand away from Sarah´s head and bent over to pay the driver, when suddenly ...  
  
"You okay, sir?" the driver asked, not interested, but out of a reflex.  
  
"Y-yes," Jesse hastened to reply and crawl out of the car.  
  
Shrugging, the driver drove off, the little girl on the backseat turned to wave goodbye.  
  
Sweet little girl, this one. Nice people, his hallucinations. But still - just for a second, Jesse had seen a dead man´s eyes in the rearview-mirror. A terribly disfigured face, bloodied, rotten.  
  
Shaking off the image, the doctor turned away and entered the hospital.  
  
You´ve not been afraid, yet.  
  
Maybe not, he thought, but he wasn´t going to be. This was just a matter of discipline. A matter of self-control.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Inside Community General Hospital, the three real people in JesseTravis´ life were worried beyond mercy .  
  
"I checked everywhere," Steve stated at the fifth request by Amanda to call "BBQ Bob´s". "Believe me, will ya?"  
  
"Everywhere?! Here, "BBQ Bob´s" and his place?! That´s everywhere?!"  
  
"It´s Jesse," Steve shot back defensively. "He´s these three places, you know that. What d´you want me to do, call the cops?"  
  
"I´m sorry, Steve, but I´m just ..."  
  
"Hey, I´m worried, too, `kay?! You didn´t see him last night, but I did! I´ve never seen him so ..."  
  
"... terrified, yeah. We heard you the first time," his father interrupted him calmingly. "We don´t doubt your story. It´s just that ... Why would he be scared of you?"  
  
"Don´t ask me!"Steve yelled frustratedly and threw his arms in the air as if he couldn´t bear to not underline his words physically.  
  
"Why would he fall down the stairs? Why would he hide a head injury? Jesse of all people! You know how he is about pity!"  
  
Mark and Amanda exchanged glances.  
  
"Yes, we know," Mark finally said. "So what do you think? That he´s really in some kinda trouble?"  
  
Suddenly Steve who´d stood with his back towards the others, thereby facing the window of the Doctor´s Lounge, tensed.  
  
"Oh yeah, he´ll be," he hissed.  
  
Confused, Mark and Amanda followed his look outside where the object of their concern was just leaving the lift.  
  
Before either of them could say a thing, Steve had bounced out of the room, furious.  
  
"Jesse!" he yelled, and the smaller man turned to ...  
  
"One "Oh hey, Steve!" from you and I´ll forget myself!"  
  
"Ahm ..." Jesse made and fell silent. He seemed to be a little relieved, though, once he´d spotted the other two members of his team approaching the scenery. It didn´t seem to be a wise thing to face Steve alone right now.  
  
"Where the hell´ve you been?!" Steve demanded, but didn´t give anyone time for an answer. "What did you think to stroll out into the night like that?! D´you imagine how worried we all were?! After the stunt you pulled in the kitchen, I thought you ..."  
  
"Steve," his father finally cut in calmingly, and even made an attempt to step between the smal, humble figure of the resident and his towering son.  
  
"It might give us some answers if you could let him answer at all."  
  
"But I wanna yell at him!"  
  
"You can continue doing that afterwards, okay?"  
  
Grumbling, Steve closed his mouth shut and crossed his arms on his breast.  
  
Risiking a glance, Jesse lifted his head just an inch to look at his friends.  
  
"So, Jess," Mark asked now, obviously as angry as his son, but definitely in more control, "you may explain now where you spent the night."  
  
It took the young doctor a second before he realized he actually had permission to speak.  
  
"Home," he said in a very small voice.  
  
That was about as far as he could get.  
  
"Home?!" Steve exploded. "How the hell did you get home, your car´s still here?!!"  
  
"I ... took a cab."  
  
"Why on earth did you go home?! And don´t tell me you sleep-walked!"  
  
"Oh ..." Jesse laughed nervously. "That ... Y´know, I ... ah ... I had some thinking to do about some ... stuff, and I thought I´d better do it at ..."  
  
"We´d better go into the Doctor´s Lounge," Steve suddenly interrupted his stuttering friend, without looking at anyone in particular, "because the volume I´m going to reach will probably wake up the whole building."  
  
"Hey!" Jesse protested bravely. "You´re being unfair! I had a very bad dream yesterday and I wanted to be at home! Why can´t you understand that?"  
  
"I would if you weren´t lying!" Steve shouted back. "And that wasn´t just a dream, Jess, you know that! You were scared of me! I ..."  
  
"Gee, why would anyone be scared of you?" Jesse shot back sarcastically.  
  
Following the doctor´s gaze, Steve noticed that he´d made an almost threatening step towards him.  
  
"He does have a point there, son."  
  
"You stay out of this!"  
  
"Oh no, I´m not, I´m ..."  
  
A sudden movement caught their attention, and the Sloans only had time to turn and see Amanda gently shoving Jesse into the Doctor´s Lounge, closing the door behind them.  
  
Exchanging a typical Sloan-look, father and son came nearer to see Jesse sitting down on the sofa and Amanda stroking his shoulder comfortingly.  
  
"D´you think we should go in?" Steve finally asked.  
  
"If you promise to lay down the yelling."  
  
"I´ll try."  
  
"Maybe you should try biting on a pillow," his father advised and entered the room.  
  
Grumbling once more, Steve followed.  
  
"So," Amanda greeted them cooly, "are you interested in hearing the truth at last?"  
  
Being confronted with Jesse´s sick-puppy-look almost got Steve on the edge of screaming again, but he swallowed the urge bravely and sat down across the sofa, prepared to listen.  
  
"Please," he gestured.  
  
Drawing in a deep breath, Jesse inwardly braced himself, then started, without looking into anyone´s eyes:  
  
"I know I acted out of character over the last few days,and I apologize. I never meant to worry you, it´s just that ever since Shay Zeesley was murdered, I keep on ... having these nightmares and I can´t concentrate on my work and stuff. I don´t sleep, you know, and I guess that makes me kinda cranky and ... Well, then there was this patient of mine, Mrs Reeds, and the break in at my apartment and ..."  
  
He sighed deeply and now looked up to meet their eyes. It almost hurt to lie at them, he found. He could see clearly now just how much they cared about him. Still he couldn´t tell them, could he? Images of his dream flashed through his mind, answering that question in an instant.  
  
"I know," he continued, confirmed about his decision, "I should have told you before, but ..." He smiled faintly. "You know me, right? I´ve to fall down the stairs to get some sense."  
  
"Or cut your hand," Steve said earnestly. "You scared the hell outta me there, you know that, Jess?"  
  
"Yeah," the doctor sighed and bowed his head. "I´m sorry."  
  
"Well,"Amanda said and again placed a hand on his shoulder. "At least you´ve told us now, so that we can help you."  
  
"Oh, I ... I don´t think that´ll be necessary. Thanks, but as I said I ... had some thinking to do back home and ... I think I´ve finally come to terms with ... everything," he finished with a wry smile.  
  
"Still you know that you can always ask us for help," Amanda reminded gently. "Don´t you?"  
  
"Yeah. Yeah, I know. Thank you." He lifted his head to look at each one them, actually grateful. "I really appreciate this."  
  
"Anytime," Mark smiled, clearly relieved, and even Steve couldn´t help but smile.  
  
"You´re one pain in the ass, Jess."  
  
"Yeah, love ya, too," Jesse grinned and stood. "But I think I´ve to go back to work now. Looks like I´ve got a patient out there."  
  
There really appeared a guy wandering around outside the room, sickly pale and obviously disoriented.  
  
As Jesse wondered why no nurse seemed to intend to help the poor man, a confused "Where?" coming from Mark behind him answered the question.  
  
The patient wasn´t real. And as though he´d suddenly found out for himself, he turned around the next corner to vanish.  
  
Jesse closed his eyes for a moment. This was going to be one hard shift ...  
  
"Ah ... must have been a visitor," he tried to safe what could be saved. "Still, I better check. Thanks again."  
  
With that, he left, trembling slightly as the shock of his first almost disastrous experience of his new life-style slackened.  
  
"Jesse!" Steve´s voice called after him when he´d almost reached the corner.  
  
"Yes!" He actually spun around, tensing again. His smile was nervous, though he tried his best to keep a grib on himself. "What?"  
  
"I was wondering if ..." the detective started, but interrupted himself and after a moment´s thought stepped closer. "You know, we never went to a funeral or anything. For Shay," he added. "And I thought maybe we could ... dunno ... say our own goodbyes some time. It´s the least we should do."  
  
"Oh. Yeah. Absolutely."  
  
"Great. How `bout tonight at "BBQ Bob´s"?"  
  
"Okay," Jesse nodded and smiled. "If you don´t just lure me into a trap to keep on yelling at me ..."  
  
"Craps, now you got me," Steve joked. "However, your bartender skills may soothe me down."  
  
"I´ll bring the milk," the young doctor laughed and was about to add another wisecrack, when he spotted a woman entering the ER, pressing a towell on an obviously injured hand.  
  
It was time to show he´d learned ...  
  
"Ah, you know, I´d love to keep up this nonsense, but - you see that woman over there?"  
  
"Ah ... yes," Steve answered after he´d turned to look in the direction Jesse pointed.  
  
Yes? Great. Thanks!  
  
"See? I´ve got a patient. See ya tonight," he waved and hurried over to the woman, feeling actually proud of himself.  
  
It was just a matter of discipline.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
And how much disciple one needed to keep the cleverness up all day, Jesse thought when the end of his shift finally became a point in timeline he could actually think of being existent ... somewhere.  
  
He´d spent most of his energy to figure out who of his patients was real over the entire day and was totally beat when he at last found the time for a much needed break in the Doctor´s Lounge.  
  
Mark Sloan had had to make a lot of second opinions on Jesse´s patients this day, for it was a pretty good sign of a person´s existance if Mark could see them, too.  
  
But of course that couldn´t be the tactics to be used on every patient he treated; the older doctor might get suspicious eventually when more than two of Jesse´s patients left before he reached them.  
  
There were other ways, though, as Jesse learned pretty quickly. Nurses for example could easily be sent to rooms and didn´t do anything but report that there´d been no one in there. They would only think he´d mixed up the room numbers.  
  
And of course you could always sent a patient into an already taken room to check out their reactions.  
  
If there were any, the doctor only needed to go in, apologize and show one of them into another room.  
  
Yes, he more or less managed to get by very well, but he had to concentrate on both, his job and tactics, which was exhausting, to say the least.  
  
"Hey," Amanda´s voice pulled him out of a pure worn-out nap. "How´s it going?"  
  
"Ahm ... great," he smiled tiredly and laughed at her doubtfull gaze. "Convincing like a politician, am I not?"  
  
"Pretty much so, yes. Your dwarfs still at work? You looked whacked."  
  
"I´ve been whacked. And yes, there´re no notifications of illness among my dwarfs, no sir!"  
  
"You should get some rest," she suggested friendlyly and sat down across him. "You know, if they don´t lay down their work soon, we may have to remove them operatively."  
  
"That would include paid vacation, wouldn´t it?"  
  
"Oh yeah! And a dozen doctors who´d kill to write an essay `bout it. "First successfull separation of dwarfs from their host" ..."  
  
"They wouldn´t kill `em, would they?!" he called out in mock shock.  
  
"No, but maybe you."  
  
"I wouldn´t know the difference," he groaned, rubbing his eyes.  
  
"Okay, just once: Awwwwww," Amanda teased, ontly to become the target of a scowl.  
  
"I really do have a bad headache!"  
  
"And I really do pity you," she smiled amusedly, "but just untill ..." She glanced at her watch. "... now. Your shift´s over, Jesse. Go home and get some sleep."  
  
"I can´t. I promised Steve to meet him at "BBQ Bob´s"."  
  
"You know, by entertaining them, you´ll never get rid of your dwarfs."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Good point, Jesse thought as he entered "BBQ Bob´s" shortly afterwards.  
  
Even driving wasn´t easy anymore, for now he felt the awkward sensation of pure self-distrust. If he saw people, couldn´t it be possible that he imagined cars, too? Maybe even buildings ...  
  
"Oh yeah - does Venice really exist?"  
  
Pushing the sarcasm aside, he called out for Steve, looking forward to a nice, quiet evening with a couple of drinks and his friend. It seemed an eternity that he´d enjoyed something like that.  
  
Steve greeted him from somewhere in the kitchen where he was busy cleaning up a self-caused mess, and Jesse turned around the bar to help him, when the phone rang.  
  
About to pick it up, he froze. Faith had called him once. And Faith wasn´t real.  
  
Eying the phone with awe, he stepped away from it like it was cursed. He couldn´t be sure wether ...  
  
"Jess! Since you´re not in here helping me, you could at least pick up the damn phone!"  
  
But when the doctor picked up the receiver, only the dialling tone answered.  
  
Frustrated, he hang up again. He was so tired, he didn´t know if he could hold this up any longer.  
  
"Who was that?" Steve asked when he emerged from the kitchen a few minutes later.  
  
"Ahm ... wrong number."  
  
"Really? How did he figure that out since you didn´t tell him our name?"  
  
"Okay, I was too slow, alright?"  
  
"What a surprise."  
  
"I had to ... tie my shoe," Jesse concluded a firmly started defens lamely. At steve´s look, he hastened to add: "You promised not to yell at me!"  
  
"I said I might rethink it if ..."  
  
"I brought the milk."  
  
As if satisfied, Steve raised his hands and sat down on the other side of the bar. "Hey, did I yell?"  
  
There it was again, the silence of two friends, Steve found himself stating happyly as he watched his business-partner prepare White Russians. He´d actually missed it, he admitted to himself.  
  
And so happy to have it back he was, that he didn´t notice the slight change, the almost invisible damage it had taken.  
  
Finally, they lifted their glasses in a moment of thought.  
  
"To Shay," Jesse said.  
  
"To Shay," Steve repeated. And they drank to the late shop-owner.  
  
"Hey," Steve asked sarcastically, "you locked the door, right?"  
  
Smiling bitterly, Jesse nodded. "Course. Wouldn´t want some strange freaks come in here, would we?"  
  
"No! They might try to get something to eat then. And we´re closed."  
  
"Absolutely! Closed!"  
  
Their gazes met - and both smiles faded.  
  
"Oh, I miss him," Steve sighed. "I know we barely knew him and stuff, but ..."  
  
"Feels like we were about to know him, right," Jesse nodded. "I miss him, too."  
  
"Columbo," Steve laughed softly at the memory and shook his head. "Freak."  
  
"D´you know what happened to his shop?" Jesse asked.  
  
"No. Guess it´s still crowded by forensics. Why?"  
  
"Oh, just my neigh ..." He stopped suddenly, feeling caught. Actually embarrassed, he looked away. "Nothing. Just ... interested."  
  
Mistaking Jesse´s hesitation for his inability to cope with Shay´s death, Steve felt discomfort growing inside him. He´d never been good at being of much help or support in situations like this, and though he´d loved to ease his friend´s pain, he wasn´t sure he could.  
  
Lost in self-accusions for being the rude, emotionless cop, he almost jumped when the phone rang again. After the first fright, he was grateful for it, though.  
  
Jesse jumped, too, but out of another reason. Shooting a glance at Steve to check if he could trust his senses on this one, he hurried to pick up quickly.  
  
" "BBQ Bob´s", we´re ... Oh. Mandy. Sure. - Yeah, you don´t sound too good, too. - Course. - No, it´ll be okay, don´t worry. Yeah, you rest. - Remember: Lots of fluids. - Sure. Bye.  
  
"Mandy calls in sick for tomorrow," he told Steve as he hang up.  
  
"What?! Why didn´t you say no?"  
  
"Because she sounded sick. What´s the problem?"  
  
"Ryan called in sick this morning. That leaves no one here for the work."  
  
"This mor ... Why didn´t you tell me?"  
  
"I forgot."  
  
"Forgot?!"  
  
"I was too busy looking for you!" Steve shot back in self-defens.  
  
"You didn´t tell me once you´ve found me, either!"  
  
"Then I had to yell at you, remember?"  
  
"Oh great!" Jesse ran a hand through his towsled hair. "So what´re we gonna do now?"  
  
"I´ve to work tomorrow. You?"  
  
"Ah ..." Oh no!  
  
" "Ah"? I take that as a "no"," Steve decided. "Then the bar´s all yours, pal."  
  
Oh no, no, no, no, no!!!  
  
In the hospital he could keep up his strategy, but it´d never work in a bar where no one would indirectly help him to get by. He wouldn´t know who to serve and who not ...  
  
"I have a night-shift," he objected, and it was even true, though he´d have nothing against some work at the "BBQ Bob´s", too, under normal circumstances.  
  
"Great, then you´re free on the day-shift. I might be able to take over around five or so."  
  
"No! You don´t understand," Jesse called out in panic. "I ... ah ... I need to rest before my shift begins."  
  
"Since when?"  
  
"Since I have a concussion!"  
  
"Jesse, I can´t! I´ve to work! You remember me having a real job? Yeah, I´ve to go there, too, from time to time. So please - and I might add that I don´t have to say please here - at least try to serve tomorrow despite your concussion, will ya?"  
  
"No."  
  
"What you mean "no"?! No as in "yes", I hope."  
  
"No, no as in "no". I won´t. Call in sick and I´ll ... help you."  
  
"Wha ... Jess, I know I´m just the cop here, but ... Are you nuts? I can´t call in sick at the station to work here! `sides - where´s the problem? You worked here before night-shifts before. And don´t give me that concussion- argument! Since you managed to do your job today just fine, it has lost it´s persuasive power."  
  
"Please," Jesse begged, forgetting about discipline. Nothing Steve would think of him could be as horrible as having to serve the next day.  
  
"No," Steve answered, laughing slightly nervously while he studyied his friend with awe. "You don´t actually mean this, do you? And no sick-puppy- look, you know it´s not working on me!"  
  
Frustrated, Jesse sighed and looked down. There was no way he would be able to persuade the detective otherwise. Hell, Steve was even right!  
  
"Okay, I´ll do it."  
  
"Of course you will," Steve said in mock surprise and sipped at his drink.  
  
Silence settled above the scenery, things were heading back to normal.  
  
"We couldn´t just, like, close the place, could we?"  
  
"Jesse!!!"  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
If he´d knew just how right he´d been about the difficulty of his task, he´d closed for the entire day, no matter what Steve would say.  
  
"Oh ... Mission Impossible," he whined from inside the kitchen, observing with growing disquiety how a crowd of people rushed into "BBQ Bob´s" around noon. This was horrible. It was the apocalypse all rolled out just for him.  
  
"Okay, Jesse, don´t panic, you can do this. No problem."  
  
"No problem," Sarah agreed next to him and grinned. "I want milk."  
  
"Oh yeah, sure, kid, go and ... drink as much milk as you can, `kay? I can´t play with you right now, I´m busy."  
  
Disappointed, the little girl strolled off.  
  
"Oh, hey, Sarah? - D´you couldn´t by any chance go out there and tell me who´s like you and who´s ... Never mind," he winked. "Go get your milk. If you need me, just appear right in front of me."  
  
"Okay," she sang and happyly skipped along.  
  
"I´ve to stop getting paternal over my hallucinations," Jesse said under his breath and after bracing himself, entered the bar, prepared to give his best.  
  
It was not impossible, but very, very hard, he found out. He had to pay attention to every single reaction he could make out among the other guests when he approached a table. He had to ignore the mostly unnaturally loud protests of the "Harveys" not being served. He had to think of a lot of tricks quickly, and once a decsion had been made, he had to deal with the consequences.  
  
In fact, it was pretty much like the work at the ER. Fortunately, for it was probably the reason why he managed it quite well.  
  
A few mistakes happened, but all in all he only served one man in a suit and tie who wasn´t there, and no one would have found out, if Jesse hadn´t jump when the man after having paid chose to vanish in the air instead of using the door ...  
  
A nice incident, a shade of hope in all the hard work was the young couple who hadn´t been one in the first place. But having spotted the nice looking teenage boy in the right and the unbearable innocently blinking teenage girl in the left corner, Jesse decided - not without given humor - to try some new tactics, by placing a glass of cola in front of each one of the test-persons and announce it to be from the other one. Since they saw, noticed and eventually smiled at each other, he could be sure they both were as real as teenagers could be.  
  
That strategy was used a lot that afternoon, not always leaving to the desired result, but never failing to do it´s purpose.  
  
Around four the bar emptied a little, much to Jesse´s relief. He was beat. Though finding time enough to sit down behind the bar, he couldn´t risk his attention to slacken. He´d to catch every single movement or word that could give a hint about a person´s existance.  
  
Wow, what a hard job! Do people actually do this to earn their mon ... Oh, no, I forgot, it´s just me being ... nuts.  
  
"Dr. Travis."  
  
Tired beyond jumpiness, Jesse looked aside to grin at Oak, who´d approached the bar without him having noticed her. That was not a good sign, he decided earnestly, but found it actually refreshing to talk to a person he simply knew not to be real.  
  
"Oak," he greeted her quietly as to not draw attention to him talking to himself. "Hey, how are you?"  
  
"Not being served."  
  
"No, you got that wrong. See, you´re supposed to be on my side here `kay? So lay down the jokes, I´m not up to it. `sides if anyone finds out about you people they´ll throw you out of this cosy head of mine. And you don´t want that to happen, do ya?"  
  
"I understand," she nodded. "Your managing all of this pretty well. I didn´t think you would."  
  
Frowning in mock hurt, he gave her a little surrendering gesture. "What are you, my inferiority complex? You´re the one they sent to talk me into suicide?"  
  
"Is that what you think?"  
  
"I´m too tired to think right now. Actually I´m too busy, too, so, Oak, why don´t you go in there and join the little girl with the milk, huh? You should talk to her, anyway, she likes me."  
  
A soft smiled rushed over her featúres, but just for a second, then her usual slightly sad, cool appearance took over again.  
  
" `nother time. I think I´ll take a seat just here and watch you ... managing."  
  
Jesse rubbed his eyes and yawned. "Yeah, sure, whatever you want. You´re welcome."  
  
"Thank you. Jesse, I think you´ve a customer over there."  
  
"Oh? Naw," Jesse winked, "did you see that tie?! Definitely a Harvey. But don´t let this get you down, Oak, some people have it and others don´t."  
  
With that he emerged from behind the bar to another table. Though concentrating on his task, he couldn´t help but freeze - just for a split second - in midstep as he heard Oak laugh loudly behind him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Congratulations, Dr. Travis, you´re the most tired looking person I´ve ever seen."  
  
"Yeah, Mark, hi to you, too."  
  
"Oh, grumpy, aren´t we?" Mark teased, but presented his more or less sleep- walking resident with a reassuring smile. "Don´t worry, you just have ... eight hours to face now untill you finally can go to sleep."  
  
"Did I miss the part where I did something to deserve this or can I just not recall it?"  
  
"Lack of sleep can cause slight amnesia, doctor. Look it out when you get home."  
  
"Hm. I´m not going to say another word before I didn´t have coffee."  
  
"I´m sorry, but that´ll have to wait. You have a patient, doctor. And I am going home. Good night."  
  
"Mark!" Jesse protested, staring at the chart in his hand in disbelief.  
  
But mercy had left Jesse´s world a long time ago. Still, before Mark Sloan could shoot back a last teasing reply, the doors were banged open and a patient on a stratcher was hurried in, parademics surrounding him.  
  
"What you got?" Jesse asked, doctor-mode taking over immediately. Mark, too, ran along with the stratcher into a free room.  
  
"Man, white, mid-thirties, shot himself in the head with a rifle," a female parademic answered hastily and literally jumped away to not block the doctor´s way.  
  
"Too late," was all Mark could state after a moment. "He´s dead."  
  
"Oh yeah?" the female parademic asked coldly. "What a loss. The little boy he also shot was right behind us. They´re bringing him in in a minute. If he´s not dead, too."  
  
"Little boy?" Jesse repeated.  
  
"Yes, that scumbag shot his twelve-year-old nephew and then himself."  
  
Silence grabbed the two doctors like a ice-cold hand as they exchanged a glance full of sympathy for ... no one and everyone. For the boy, the poor man, the world. What to say in a moment of such truth?  
  
What to think except ...  
  
"Oh my god!"  
  
"Jesse?"  
  
"Th-that´s my patient! That´s ..." Shocked, Jesse stared at the dead man´s torn face, cruelly disfigured, but still recognizable as it was.  
  
"Calm down, Jess, there´ll be another one in a few moments," Mark said seemingly hard, but inside feeling his heart reach out for his young friend.  
  
"No, you don´t understand! It´s Dillard! The guy who smashed his hand and ran when I tried to ... Oh god, I can´t believe he ..." His head jerked up as panic rushed through his body. "Oh god, oh god ..." he whispered, his eyes wide in fear as suddenly a picture was forming in his mind, a picture so bizarr and horrible like nothing he´d ever imagined. And he felt it, too. Felt what Dillard must have felt when ...  
  
"He was afraid of him," the young doctor whispered, clearly terrified. "Afraid of the kid. He was so afraid that ..."  
  
His hand rushed to his mouth, as the urge to wretch grabbed him, and within a second he was out of the room, ignoring Mark´s calls behind him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
You´ve not been afraid, yet.  
  
"Stop that!" Jesse yelled and grabbed his head with both hands, wincing as his still sore one ached from the pressure.  
  
"I´m not afraid!"  
  
But he was. Afraid of what he would see once he left the restroom. Afraid of a dead boy´s body lying on a table next to his killer´s, his uncle´s ... Afraid of Dillard´s hunted eyes, hunting him in the darkness of his mind from where there was no way out. No back door to escape it.  
  
Afraid of himself.  
  
"I´m not afraid!" he shouted and without thinking, out of pure fury, hit the wall with an unconsciously made fist hard.  
  
It hurt. It felt in control.  
  
He hit the wall again. Now, even a little spot of sticky wetness could be seen on the cement. A proof of his ...  
  
... insanity. As if the very human color had cleared his head, Jesse lifted his hand to study his knuckles, were the skin had burst open and the blood had emerged from. It had been his good hand.  
  
The one with which he´d tried to clean Dillard´s wound the other day ...  
  
"Oh no," the doctor laughed nervously. "Oh no, I´m not ... going there. Wrong. You hear me?!" He called out for no one. "I´m not afraid of anyone! I´m not hitting walls or shooting relatives! I´m a doctor! I´m different!"  
  
Convinced and in control again, he looked back at his image in the mirror - and flinched when he saw a dead, motionless, ugly face behind his own. Dried blood covered the man´s sickly blue skin, and his mouth had dropped open. The eyes were the worst, still open, almost staring back at Jesse, but dead and black and rotten.  
  
Slowly, carefully, Jesse turned to -nothing. No dead guy in the restroom.  
  
"Just in my head," he growled under his breath and splashed water in his face to shake off every image his mind could think of.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Later that shift, Mark Sloan entered the Doctor´s Lounge to find his young friend sitting on the sofa, his head bowed. A miserable small figure. Like a lost puppy, the elder doctor thought and winced slightly in sympathy.  
  
"Hey Jesse," he said softly and sat down next to him. "Feeling better?"  
  
"Yeah. I´m sorry, Mark," Jesse said honestly, but without looking up at his boss. "I really are. I freaked out. Won´t happen again."  
  
"`sokay," Mark winked, and patted the doctor´s shoulder gently. "Every resident has the right to ... "freak out" I think five or six times during his first five years. Of course the exact number is regulated by the bureaucrats, I can look it out for you some time. But I think you´re nowhere near the limit, yet."  
  
Still staring at the floor, Jesse chuckled. It felt good to see him do that, Mark thought. It was such a typical Jesse-gesture, one missed it after a short while.  
  
"`sides he was your patient. It´s only natural that you felt responsable. Which you are not," he added, stressing every word of the sentence.  
  
"Hm. - The boy, did he make it?"  
  
"Oh, yes. Got hit on the shoulder, the poor kid, and lost a lot of blood, but it wasn´t as bad as we thought. He probably lost consciousness immediately which made Dillard believe he was dead. The little fellow was lucky."  
  
"Lucky," Jesse sneered.  
  
"Yes," Mark nodded earnestly. "He could have been dead."  
  
"Still, he should have been not put through this at all," Jesse said, finally lifting his head to cast his boss and friend a desperate look full of guilt. "And I should have known."  
  
"How?"  
  
"He was my patient! I treated him and I talked to him and I noticed that he was on the edge of a nervous breakdown! I should have let him checked out by Thorman immediately! I should have tied him to bed or whatever ... drug him ... just to keep him away from his ..." He sighed deeply. "I should have helped him."  
  
"There was no way you could have forseen that, Jesse," Mark assured him. "You´re only a doctor, doctor. You can´t save everybody."  
  
No kidding! I can´t even save myself!  
  
Once again, Mark was witness of one of those loathed Jesse-smiles as the younger doctor nodded bitterly and secretly wiped away a single tear.  
  
"That´s not what a doctor wants to hear, huh? There should be a law against people dying in a hospital. It´s so thoughtless of them!"  
  
Though he laughed in sympathy, Mark couldn´t bring himself to leave the young man just now and they remained silent for a little while. Two doctors after a patient´s death.  
  
Finally the older one of them had to stiffle a yawn and glancing at his watch, stood. "I´ve to get some sleep. In a few hours my shift starts."  
  
"Yeah, course, you better be ..." Jesse started, but hushed down in an instant as his gaze wandered outside the room, where another dead man lay. Equally rotten and scaring as the one in the restroom, but standing in front of the window, looking directly at him.  
  
Jese could feel how all color emerged from his face.  
  
"Jesse?" Mark asked concernedly and followed the other one´s gaze outside, where nothing could be seen. "Jess, are you alright?"  
  
"Sure," Jesse managed to chocke out. "Fine. Great. But you really need to get home and take a ... nap," he finished his sentence in a whisper, for another corpse had appeared out of nowhere, in the Lounge this time.  
  
"And I should be checking on the patients," Jesse hastened to say, but couldn´t help staring at the body lying sprawled on one of the tables.  
  
Again, Mark followed his gaze and saw a table.  
  
"You sure you´re alright?"  
  
Jesse didn´t hear him. He was too busy fighting the hysteria slowly crawl up his body, while he took a step over another corpse on the floor as casually as he could. As he reached the door, he opened it while smiling brightly at Mark. He wasn´t prepared for the bloodied mess lying curled up in front of the door and jumped at the horrible sight.  
  
Now he could hear them, too. Moaning, whimpering ...  
  
Oh god, what is this?  
  
He only found that he was still standing in the entry, staring at the corpse, when he felt Mark´s hand gently ruttling his shoulder.  
  
"Jesse? What´s the matter?" the older doctor asked and tried to look directly at him, but somehow the younger man´s gaze drifted off as if drawn into several directions. He was trembling slightly and a light shade of sweat appeared on his forehead.  
  
"I ... uh ..." Jesse stumbled and swallowed at the appearance of yet another unbearable sight. "Gotta go. See ya, Mark. Goodnight."  
  
With that he almost ran down the hallway,trying to avoid looking anywhere but right ahead.  
  
He wasn´t aware that he was followed by a suspicious look. A look that was used to catch what it wanted to catch. And that saw what it wanted to see. Even if it wasn´t real.  
  
"Maybe no dwarfs," Mark quietly told himself as he entered the lift. "But rabbits." 


	9. Cookie Hell 9

Back from the place with no net I am!  
  
And here it is the chapter in which ... Oh yeah, right, read for yourself!  
  
By the way: Fruitloops!!!! Yeah, you know, kid, don´t ya? MISS YA!!!! But, hey, stop hitting that poor boy! He´s sick! *sigh* And ... COME BACK SOON!!!!  
  
Thanks for the reviews, guys. I´m SO glad you like this stuff! (Don´t awww me, I´m really touched! Honestly!) Thankyou!  
  
Disclaimer, yaddah, yaddah, blah, blah ... I don´t even own the name "Hapgood", it´s from "Anyone can whistle". Still, Oak and the Harveys are all mine (Exchange hallucinations against cute ER-doctor! Anyone?)  
  
Enjoy the cookies!  
  
  
  
Shube: "You won´t let those 49 lunics ...  
  
Nurse Apple: "NOT THAT word! Nor any word like it! Cookies, Shube, that´s what my  
  
patients are! Cookies from the Cookie Jar!"  
  
("Anyone Can Whistle")  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Night-shifts were always frustrating. Even if they were quiet or successfull in any way, it was still a bizarr, depressing feeling to step out of the building, exhausted, beat, dead-tired, and to twinkle into the bright morning son.  
  
It always felt upside down, and Jesse grew even more exhausted by the mere sight of the daylight.  
  
Today - today he didn´t feel exhausted. He felt out of order.  
  
He was scared of every corner he had to turn around, every room he had to enter, every lift he had to use, every time he had to open his eyes.  
  
Death had reached the safe ground of his mind, and inpolite as it was, it had settled there, spreading on each one of his nerves, manipulating his senses to make them smell blood that wasn´t there, hear moans that weren´t made.  
  
As a doctor, Jesse Travis had seen a lot of dead people. Some who´d died mercyfully quiet in their sleep, other who´d bled to death on his examination table. He´d seen eyes which had closed in expectation of relief and release, and others which had grown wide in unbearable terror at the realization of death towering them, covering them, grabbing them, taking them. Too fast to allow their eyes to close.  
  
Oh yes, Jesse knew death, he´d faught against him in many ways, he´d braced himself over the years. He could bear to see the terror it brought, the ugliness that accompanied it sometimes.  
  
Yet, he couldn´t bear to see disfigured bodies lying everywhere he stepped, everywhere he looked. It was so bizarr, if this had been a movie, he´d have laughed. But it was his reality, unreal as it was, still, he saw corpses lying in the restrooms, the examination rooms, on tables, on chairs, in lifts, huddled in corners ... Where he went, death followed him as though it made fun of the poor doctor who´d dared to pick up a fight against it.  
  
Jesse had tried everything over the entire shift. Ignore them. But how could he ignore the terrible smell, the shrieking yells of dying men? Keep his humor as he had with the Crabtrees and the others, but how could he joke about the unbearable sights, the sounds, the smell? Hide in a restroom, desperately clutching his head to not have to see them. But still there was the smell, there was the sense of death.  
  
No way out. There was no way out.  
  
Dr. Travis could feel his eyes becoming hunted. As Dillards.  
  
Still he managed to get more or less by when it came to his job. His tactics still worked, and fortunately it was a quiet night with only two real emergencies and otherwise rather trival wounds. But even sucturing a cut thumb could be torture when a dead boy was sitting on the other side of the patient´s bed ...  
  
He made a break in the empty Doctor´s Lounge around six, when he suddenly heard a faint noise from outside the room. A child´s sobs he found when straining to hear it, and stepping outside to look, he spotted Sarah next to the door. She was huddled against the wall, her little face hidden in her hands which rested on her knees.  
  
Checking for any witnesses, Jesse bent down to her.  
  
"Sarah," he whispered. "Honey, what´s wrong?"  
  
"They´re dead," the child answered, not looking up at him. "They´re all dead."  
  
"Yeah, I know." Gently, he stroke her soft hair.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Dunno." He checked once more, and sat down next to her, drawing her into a comforting hug. "Come here, kid. C´mon, stop crying, hm? It´s okay."  
  
"I´m scared," she whispered into his ear.  
  
"You don´t have to be. They´re not real. `sides, I´m with you."  
  
Frowning innocently, she glanced up at him. "You´re not scared?"  
  
"No," he lied and hugged her tighter. "None of this scares me."  
  
Behind the corner, only a few metres away from the scenery, a deep frown grow on a hidden figure´s forehead.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Jesses shift was over, yet the ordeal was not. It seemed as though death didn´t plan on leaving it´s new victim so soon, and it´s terrible faces followed the young man all the way to the parking lot, where he sacked against a wall in pure desperation, closing his eyes.  
  
"Stop," he whispered faintly and slid down to the ground. "Please, stop."  
  
"It won´t," a stern voice broke into his pleas.  
  
Opening his eyes, Jesse found himself looking up at Oak. There was pity in her eyes. Anger, too. Guilt. And fear.  
  
But Jesse saw none of this. "Leave me alone," he murmured and came to his feet.  
  
"I can see it in your eyes, Jesse. You´re ..."  
  
"Oak! I don´t wanna hear this! Which part of my brain do I have to have removed to make you go away?! Ah ... I didn´t mean that the way it came out, so don´t give me any "I succeed!"-yells here, `kay? Bye!"  
  
She followed him as he continued his way. "Oh yeah, I see you´re still managing, Dr. Travis," she teased angrily. "Still not afraid?"  
  
At his sudden stop, she laughed an ugly, low laugh. "Did you really think this would be it? Accept the little girl and everything´s fine? You can´t possibly be that naive, doctor! Hey, when was the last time you saw a happy lunatic, huh?"  
  
His hand was around her throat too fast for both of them to wonder how it´d got there. Surprise gave way to fear on one and pure fury on the other side.  
  
"What´re you ..." the womam chocked and caughed horasely. "What´re you doing?"  
  
"This is all your fault!" he shouted at her and tightened his grib. "You keep saying I mustn´t be afraid and I mustn´t accept it and all this stuff, but I see clearly now, Oak. You´re the problem!"  
  
"Jesse," Oak croaked. She was on her knees now, her fingers tried desperately to get a grib on Jesse´s hand still wrapped around her throat. "Don´t ..."  
  
"You´ve been a pain in the ass ever since I saw you for the very first time, and I´m not gonna listen to you anymore! You hear me? I´m not afraid of you!"  
  
"Please ..." she begged faintly.  
  
"Oh please now, Oak?" he replied wickedly. "You´re not afraid, are ya? I should have ..."  
  
"You can´t!" she called out in a chocked cry. "I´m ... not real!"  
  
Confused, he stared at her. At his hand holding her. And as if he´d suddenly realized he held a poisened frog, he let her go, almost throwing her away from him.  
  
She sat where she landed, rubbing her throat, caughing.  
  
Shocked, Jesse´s gaze wandered back to his hands. They were trembling now. His cut one hurt from the tight grib.  
  
"Jesse," Oak caughed.  
  
But he didn´t listen. She was not real. Would he have let her go if she´d been real?  
  
He´d wanted to hurt her. He´d wanted to stop being afraid.  
  
"Jesse ..."  
  
He turned and ran to his car.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
His head pounded against the pillow. His heart hammered against the blanket. The dead man´s finger knocked against the wall.  
  
Jesse lay in his bed, blanket touching his nose, and squeezed his eyes shut. Still, the smell alone killed him.  
  
The dead man had awaited him in his bedroom, when he´d finally come home and stumbled on his bed. There´d been only few times he´d needed a good ... day´s sleep as bad as today. Even in his car there´d been a dead woman sitting on the back seat, her head had lolled from one side to another in a scarry rhythm.  
  
He´d been terrified the whole ride long, but he was beyond terror now. This was his apartment, his bedroom, his bed. Dead guy or not, he needed sleep.  
  
But it wasn´t that easy. Once his eyes had closed and he´d fought the urge to keep them open to stare at the body in the corner, said body had started to produce noises. Moans at first, then the knocking.  
  
"D´you think that´s scarry?" Jesse said, his eyes still closed. "You ever watched "Poltergeist"? Now, that was scarry! "The Frighteners"? "Haunted Hill"? Hell, "Caspar" was scarrier than y ... Aaaah!" he yelled as he opened his eyes slightly to suddenly find the corpse right next to him on the bed.  
  
Within a split second, he was out of the bed, actually falling out of it and jumping to his feet and away from the bed.  
  
"That was so unfair!" he panted. "You can´t pretend to be dead, and then move! Didn´t they tell you that once you´re dead you mustn´t move ever again?!"  
  
Somebody had obviously told him that he wasn´t allowed to speak.  
  
"Okay, fine, you keep the bed, I take the sofa. And don´t follow me!"  
  
Trembling, the doctor swayed over to his living-room, only to find the sofa already occupied.  
  
"Oh, you gotta be kidding! Out! All of you!"  
  
But they´d learnt about the not moving part, as it seemed.  
  
"Can´t you understand?" Jesse pleaded, tears were whelming up in his eyes. If out of fear, exhaustion, or simply everything, he couldn´t tell. He didn´t even notice it as they finally fell down his cheeks.  
  
"I´m tired! I need to sleep! I´ve to go to work again in a few hours, and I can´t keep anything up when I´m tired! They´ll find out and then they´ll lock me away. And they´ll kill you. But I guess that´s not really a threat to you people, huh?" he laughed, crying.  
  
"What am I gonna do?" he sobbed and sank down to the ground, hugging his knees like a child. "What am I gonna do? Please go. Please."  
  
"Why´re you crying?" Sarah asked and looked down at him.  
  
"I´m not," he sobbed.  
  
"Yes, you are," she stated casually and placed her tiny hand on his head. "You´re scared, aren´t you?"  
  
"Oh Sarah." Once more he pulled her into a hug.  
  
"Can´t you make them go away?" she asked.  
  
"No," he whispered. "I can´t." A faint sob escaped him as he hugged the little girl tighter. "I can´t, kid."  
  
"Your friends could."  
  
"I´ve no friends."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Finally, Jesse decided that since he couldn´t sleep, anyway, he didn´t want to spent his free time with a bunch of dead guys, too, and drove off to "BBQ Bob´s". Maybe there was even some sleep to catch there.  
  
He loved the place. At time it felt more like home than his own apartment. He knew every table, every chair, and he felt in order there. Satisfied. He was never exhausted at the "BBQ Bob´s", but felt as though on vacation there.  
  
It was the perfect counterpart to the hospital. It was only a small station in people´s life, more or less unimportant. Not like the hospital, where their lives were often changed in incredible ways. "BBQ Bob´s" was just a place and out of that reason Jesse loved it as much as he did.  
  
He parked his car and the two corpses sitting on the back seats across the bar in a side street, and was just about to cross the street, when he spotted two familiar figures studying the little building still being marked with red plastic tape.  
  
Surprised, he approached them and even forgot his usual carefulness.  
  
"Shay, Faith."  
  
"Jesse!" Faith greeted him and grinned. "Hey! How´s it going? Still crazy? Oh, how thoughtless of me. Since you can see us, you must still ..."  
  
"Stop babbling, wife!" Shay ordered and offered Jesse his hand who shook it, smiling. "Jesse, how´re you? You look terrible."  
  
"Ah, thanks. You look great, but I wouldn´t let you get sick then, would I? What ... ahm ... what´re you doing here?"  
  
"Taking a look at the shop you told us about," Shay answered and turned to look at "Moriaty´s". The sign was still there. Jesse felt his mouth go dry.  
  
"Why?" he asked earnestly.  
  
Frowning, Faith grinned and lightly slapped his shoulder. "Because we´re still looking for a shop, stupid. Don´t you listen to your hosts?"  
  
"But you ... You can´t buy a shop. You´re ..."  
  
"Shhh," Faith hushed him down, looking around suspiciously. "someone might hear you. They´re probably full of prejudices against Harveys. One mustn´t tell everything to those business-men, you know?"  
  
Tired, Jesse rubbed his eyes. "Oh god, why am I talking to you?"  
  
"`cause we´re nice," Faith grinned at him. "Nice people."  
  
He didn´t know why, but all of a sudden he got angry. Furious.  
  
"Nice people, oh yeah!" he sneered. "Like you said the other day, Faith, huh? "What´s there to be afraid of? We´re nice people. We´re just going to visit you from time to time!" Yaddah, yaddah! And now? How nice is everything now? How very nice are the people I see in my bedroom, in my car?!"  
  
"It´s not my fault you´re a doctor and thereby have doctor-hallucinations, Jesse!" Faith replied slowly.  
  
"Doctor hallucinations?!" Jesse repeated scornfully. "Veteran-hallucination would be more precise I think! I want this to stop!"  
  
But he stopped himself when he suddenly noticed he´d made a threatening step forward and was now standing nose to nose to Faith Crabtree who stared at him in fear.  
  
"Jesse," Shay said and gently, but firmly drew him away from his wife, "calm down."  
  
"You need help," Faith agreed and stroke his cheek. "God, you look terrible."  
  
"I already said that."  
  
"It´s more true when I say it."  
  
"Wha ... That doesn´t make any sense, Faith!"  
  
"Oh no?! I would never tell anyone that he looks terrible if it wasn´t true!"  
  
"But I would?"  
  
"You´re telling me every morning. - And don´t say what you wanna say right now, ´cause ... Jesse?"  
  
The doctor didn´t look back, but continued his way back to his car. Shay´s and Faith´s calls followed him till he was on the road again.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Hey Mark," Amanda greeted her friend when he entered "BBQ Bob´s" and approached the table she and Steve sat on. "You look tired."  
  
He yawned for an answer.  
  
"He is," Steve translated with a smile. "He´s been up all night."  
  
"Night-shift?" Amanda asked pityfully.  
  
"Nope. Spying on Jesse," Steve answered and stood to get his dad a cup of coffee.  
  
Before Amanda could even open her mouth to verbalize her confused look, Mark raised a hand. "Guilty as charged. Well, I ... followed him over his shift and ... I think I found the reason for his strange behaviour."  
  
"The one he told us or another one?" Steve asked dryly and placed a steaming cup in front of his father.  
  
Accepting it gratefully, Mark smiled sadly. "Another one," he said and Steve nodded.  
  
"I knew it. He´s in trouble, right?"  
  
"Oh yes. - But not what you think."  
  
Now concern showed in Amanda eyes. "What is it?"  
  
Drawing in a deep breath, Mark braced himself before saying clearly: "He´s seeing people."  
  
"What?!" a simultanious half-yell escaped the others, though they quieted instantly at the guest´s startled looks. "What?"  
  
"I know it´s hard to believe, but ..."  
  
"Not really," Steve interrupted.  
  
Though he chuckled slightly, Mark knew this was not going to be easy. "I mean it, Steve. I saw him talking to people who were not there several times. The last time was a minute ago. Outside on the street, in front of your late friend´s shop. He was yelling at someone named Faith."  
  
All color emerged from Steve´s face at the mention of Mrs Crabtree´s name. "That´s his neighbor," he said softly. "She was on the phone the other day. Here."  
  
"Steve?" his father asked frowning as Steve´s gaze wandered over to the phone.  
  
"I-it didn´t ring, you know? I didn´t hear it ringing, but still Jesse picked it up and he talked to Faith about ... I don´t remember. He´d been invited over for dinner to them. I thought I just hadn´t heard it."  
  
"You hadn´t," Mark nodded. "`cause the phone didn´t ring. It was a hallucination."  
  
"Oh god," Amanda said as her memory also kicked in. "I heard him talk to someone the day he told me about the burglary. He was answering someone in his polite Jesse-tone, you know."  
  
Mark smiled.  
  
"But I couldn´t hear anyone asking questions, and then I bumped into Jesse, and he said, there´d been an insucrance agent who´d gone on his nerves. You think ..."  
  
"An hallucination."  
  
"And when I found him sitting on the steps outside ..." Steve started, but trailed off as another thought hit him. "And in the kitchen ..."  
  
"Yes," Mark sighed. "That must have been pretty scarry for him. First ... you," he smiled, "and then ... Steve, you said he got startled twice, didn´t you?"  
  
"Yeah, once when I approached him, and on the floor when I was treating his hand. - He was staring ... behind me. Then he ran outside. He told me he´d had a nightmare and that he´d just snapped out of it."  
  
"Well, sort of," Mark said. "I think that was when he found out."  
  
"Found out?" Amanda repeated. "You think he knows?"  
  
Mark nodded earnestly. "Oh yes, he knows. And he knows that we´ll find out eventually. But he´s so scared of us, he´s trying to keep a normal surface up." He laughed slightly at the memory of the last shift. "He used us to get by unnoticed. He let me take a look at patients to find out wether they´re real."  
  
"That´s why he didn´t want to work here yesterday," Steve said to no one in particular. "He was afraid he wouldn´t manage to ..."  
  
"Oh god," Mark laughed in sympathy. "Must be pretty hard to serve in a bar when you don´t know who´s real and who isn´t."  
  
"Yeah," Steve nodded half-heartedly and looked around as though someone would start a strike the next second. "Still he did it ..."  
  
"Don´t worry." Assuringly, Mark patted his son´s arm. "If he managed to do this as well as he did at the hospital, it wasn´t that bad. He probably didn´t serve one or two guests, but you guys would be very unlucky if of all people these would have been journalists."  
  
"Sarcasm not appreciated," Steve murmured, still looking around for known faces.  
  
"More important than the bar is Jesse," Amanda stated firmly. "What´re we gonna do about all this? We can´t just go and ask him, can we?"  
  
Thinking, Mark shook his head. "No. He would probably deny it, anyway. And then - I think he´s far too afraid of us to trust us."  
  
"Why would he be afraid?" Amanda asked. "We want to help him. We´re his friends, he knows that."  
  
"I guess he thinks we´ll lock him away. Admit him to a looney bin and ... Dunno."  
  
"Ahm, Dad, I don´t wanna sound cruel or anything, but ... that´s exactly what we´re gonna do, right?"  
  
The following silence could have splatted down a grown-up cow.  
  
"He´s sick," Mark stated finally. "He needs help. In a ... medical way. It´s not only that he´s talking to some fitional friends, I think there´s more. He´s pretty scared of something. Something terrible he´s seeing. We have to help him before it could be too ... late."  
  
"So, how do we get him to admit that he´s insane?" Steve asked.wryly. "´cause, if he doesn´t, you´ll have to send him to a cook ... you know, against his will. And that ..."  
  
" ... will lead to him losing his majority. He´d be fired and might never be allowed to work as a doctor again," Amanda concluded.  
  
"Of course we won´t do that," Mark said. "I could never do that to Jesse. No, we´ll do what we always do."  
  
"Which is?"  
  
"Being clever," the older doctor grinned. "We´ll trick him."  
  
"How?" the other two asked.  
  
"I have a plan." With that, Mark Sloan stood and left the bar.  
  
Steve and Amanda stared after him then at each other.  
  
"Great. A plan."  
  
  
  
  
  
Since his apartment was crowded with dead people and he couldn´t stand the sight of his hallucinations getting all excited about their new shop, Jesse had decided to spent the spare time before his shift started again working at the hospital.  
  
There, dead people and the smell of blood wasn´t as irritating as at home, anyway. But exhausted he was, desperate.  
  
Despair was not new to him, and he´d had dealt with it before. He was no one to give up easily, he was - though few would have thought that of him - a fighter in a way. He´d made it through many hard situations, he´d made it through everything life had placed in his way to make him stumble ...  
  
Yet, he couldn´t imagine to make it this time.  
  
Tired, hopeless, he sank down on the sofa in the empty Doctor´s Lounge and hid his face in his hands, trying to blank out everything around him.  
  
But he could hear them moaning.  
  
How long did he sit there till somebody finally entered the room, breaking in the silence? Hours? Minutes? He couldn´t tell. He only knew that he felt even more tired when he lifted his head to look up at Amanda, smiling down at him in sympathy.  
  
"Hey Jesse. Were you at home at all? You look tired."  
  
"I ... ah, I had some paper-work to work off," he smiled and quickly swept a hand over his face as if to clean it from the shadows of despair.  
  
"Ah," she nodded. "I see. But you´re done now, yeah?"  
  
"Ahm ..." Glancing at his watch, Jesse nodded. " Yeah. Done. Ah, Amanda, did you ..."  
  
He stopped himself, when a tall, dark-haird man entered the Lounge, looking directly at him. He was wearing a grey suit tie, matching strikingly grey eyes which were set above a long, thin nose, also matching long, thin lips.  
  
"Dr. Travis," the man announced Jesse in a deep, clear-cut voice. "I´d like to talk to you."  
  
He had a clear British accent, and Amanda gave absolutely no sign of having noticed him.  
  
"Jesse?" she asked instead.  
  
Deciding that since Amanda obviously couldn´t see the Englishman, he shouldn´t, either, Jesse blinked and smiled at her. "Sorry, I got distracted here. I wanted to ask if you´ve done the autopsie on Dillard yet."  
  
Frowning, Amanda bent her head to one side. "That the man who shot himself?"  
  
"Yes," Jesse nodded. "And his nephew."  
  
"Ah. Yeah, now I remember. No, I haven´t got permission yet. I think I´ll get it by tomorrow morning. Why? D´you think there´s something special about him?"  
  
"Maybe," Jesse muttered, but shook his head with a smile when his gaze met hers. "No. No, probably not. I was just ... He was my patient, you know. I just wanted to make sure that I ... didn´t fail to notice anything."  
  
"Dr. Travis. I really think we two should talk," the Englishman said. He´d never left his place next to the young doctor and was still looking down at him, with an almost frightening intensity.  
  
Still, Jesse ignored him as best as he could.  
  
"I´m sure there was nothing to be noticed," Amanda said comfortingly. "Such things happen, Jesse. There was no way you could have forseen that."  
  
"Oh yeah," he grinned bitterly. "Such thing keep happening, alright."  
  
"Dr. Travis ..."  
  
"Will you please," Jesse cut the Englishman off inpatiently, but turned to Amanda fast enough to not risk seeming suspicious, "keep me posted on Dillard?"  
  
"Sure."  
  
"Thanks."  
  
"Dr. Trav ..."  
  
"I gotta go now. My shift starts ... soon." With that, he hurried outside.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Jesse didn´t see the Englishman again till late afternoon, when he entered the Doctor´s Lounge for a break.  
  
It was not that he´d gotten used to the dead people, but dead-tired, he couldn´t think ahead. He treated a patient, another one, like a robot. He couldn´t bring himself to even smile at them or chatter with the nurses. He walked from room to room as if walking through a nightmare. There was no hope of waking up. There was no hope of whatsoever.  
  
All there was was fear. And it wouldn´t go away.  
  
What to do?  
  
Keep on moving.  
  
What to do?  
  
Keep on working.  
  
Keep on ... keep on ... keep on ...  
  
He didn ´t even manage to smile when he greeted the Sloans and Amanda in the Doctor´s Lounge. With a deep sigh he sank onto a chair next to Amanda and rubbed a hand over his eyes.  
  
"Well, doctor," Mark said good-humoredly, "you should consider spending your free time sleeping next time."  
  
"I will," Jesse smiled tiredly. "Believe me. I´ll probably fall asleep within the next four hours, anyway."  
  
"Hopefully not while you´re driving," Steve teased. "Or dooing the books in "BBQ Bob´s"."  
  
"Oh gawd, was that today?" Jesse groaned.  
  
"Nope. Kidding."  
  
"That´s not funny!"  
  
"Dr. Travis," a voice called over Steve´s reply and soon afterwards, the Englishman´s tall figure stepped in range of sight. He entered the room and came to a halt next to the door. "We need to talk."  
  
"Jess," Steve announced him, smiling slightly confusedly. "Hey, you heard me?"  
  
"Wha ... I, uh, sure," Jesse answered and turned to face him again. None of his friends paid any attention towards the stranger. Proof enough for the Englishman´s composition, the young doctor decided and ignored the man´s following requests.  
  
"So?" Steve asked and raised his brows in expectation of an answer.  
  
"Ah ..." Jesse stuttered, since he hadn´t heard the question.  
  
"Something wrong?" Mark asked now.  
  
Alarmed, Jesse shook his head. "No, I ..."  
  
"Dr. Travis."  
  
"I ..."  
  
"Dr. Travis ..."  
  
"Excuse me."  
  
Under his friends´ worried glances, Jesse rushed to his feet and outside, were he leant against the wall, closing his eyes, drawing in deep, calming breaths.  
  
Don´t give up now, he ordered himself. You can do this. You can ...  
  
Hi eyes flew open when he suddenly heard the Englishman´s voice coming out of the Doctor´s Lounge. And then Mark´s. Answering.  
  
Answering?  
  
Slowly Jesse pushed himself off the wall and stepped back into the room, staring in disbelief at what he saw.  
  
The stranger had taken the seat he, Jesse, had sat on before, and looked up at him in union with Amanda, Steve and Mark.  
  
"What the hell ...?" Jesse whispered.  
  
A short pause passed, before Mark raised a hand to point at the Englishman and said calmly: "Jesse, I want you to meet Dr. Hapgood. He´s a psychiatrist from the "Apple Memorial Hospital". He´d like to ask you a few questions."  
  
"Dr. Travis," the stranger, Dr. Hapgood, nodded politely.  
  
Steve bowed his head. But Jesse had seen the guilt flashing through his eyes.  
  
"This is a set-up," he stated in fright. "You tricked me."  
  
"Yes," Mark nodded. "Yes, Jess, we did."  
  
"You ... you set me up. Like I was ... Like you do with ..." His voice faded.  
  
"Jesse, please ..." Amanda started, but didn´t know what to say.  
  
"No one meant any harm, Dr. Travis," Dr. Hapgood said in a calm, clear voice. "Your friends believe you need help and they called me, because I can help you."  
  
"Help," Jesse sneered.  
  
"Yes, Jesse, we ..." Mark said, but was cut short by Jesse´s angry yell.  
  
"I don´t need your help! I don´t need you! You set me up!"  
  
"We had to. You´d have den..."  
  
"You tricked me!" Jesse yelled and backed away when Steve stood to calm him down. "Don´t come near me!"  
  
"Jess ..."  
  
"No, I said!" he shouted and backed away even more, hitting the wall behind him. From there he reached for the door, while Steve raised his hands as if showing he wasn´t armed.  
  
The others just kept looking at the bizarr scene, not knowing what to do.  
  
"Jess," Steve said calmingly, desperately, "please don´t do this."  
  
"You´re sick, doctor," Hapgood stated firmly, ignoring the other´s gazes frowning at his tone. "You have to be treated properly. Now you know that, right?"  
  
The frightened man hesitated, but after a while nodded softly. "Yeah," he whispered. "I know."  
  
"You´re having hallucinations," Hapgood continued. "Hallucinations which scare you."  
  
Again, Jesse nodded, but pressed himself against the wall even more when Steve attempted to touch his shoulder comfortingly.  
  
"Yes, I know," Hapgood said. "We all scare you, too. But you know that we´re right. You´re a doctor. You know that illnesses can be healed - if the patient co-operates."  
  
"This is different," Jesse shot back angrily, but calm as his friends noticed with relief and astonishment. "I don´t trick my patients. I don´t lock them up. I don´t ..." He swallowed another harsh sentence as if he knew he´d hurt his friends by saying it, then looked up at them, betrayal written all over his face.  
  
"You just want to get rid of me, don´t you? You want to admit me to some cookie jar so that you´ll never have to think of me again! You want to leave me alone with them!" he was shouting now, his hands clenching to fists, as his friends watched in shock.  
  
"Them?" Hapgood asked gently, raising his brows in interest. "Who are them, doctor?"  
  
"They´re all around," Jesse replied, his gaze darting away from Hapgood into several directions. "I can smell them," he added in a chocked whisper. "I can hear them moaning. Oh god," he begged faintly, adressing no one, "please stop. Just ... stop." Covering his ears, he slid down the wall into a huddled position and closed his eyes.  
  
While Hapgood sighed slightly as he looked down at his patient, Steve, Amanda and Mark exchanged horrified glances. How long had this been going on? How long had Jesse pretended to be slightly distressed by Shay Zeesley´s death, but had been haunted by terrible hallucinations?  
  
"Jesse," Amanda said ever so softly and made a tentative step towards her friend, only to be stopped by a gentle movement of Hapgood´s hand, followed by a slight shaking of his head.  
  
Though he didn´t dare to touch his broken friend, Steve couldn´t bear towering above him, looking down at him, and so he crouched down beside him. Instantly, the younger man flinched violently, his eyes flew open.  
  
"Sorry, I ..." Steve hastened to say and jumped back to his feet again. Jesse had fallen backwards and was now sitting with his hands steading him behind his back, looking up at the detective, terrified.  
  
A short silence followed, before a nervous laugh broke it. "Look at me," Jesse stated scornfully, but laughing. His blue eyes were bright, beyond tears. Beyond hope.  
  
"I hit the wall the other day," the young doctor said and lifted a shaking hand. "See? There. Like Dillard. I don´t even know ...why." He laughed out again. "I wanted to feel in control again. But I´m not." He bowed his head bitterly. "I´m not managing anymore. I´m afraid."  
  
No one replied a thing, they kept on staring him talking to no one in particular. Finally, he swallowed hard as if to brace himself and whispered, without looking up at them: "Help me. Please."  
  
Relief washed through all of them.  
  
"Yes." Mark was the first one to speak, sounding almost happy at this request. "Yes, Jesse, we´ll help you. I promise."  
  
An almost grateful smile started to spread on Jesse´s lips, when he suddenly turned to look outside the window to the hallway.  
  
"Dr. Travis?" Hapgood asked, alarmed. When Jesse didn´t react, but started to get to his feet, the psychiatrist mentioned Steve to cover the door quickly.  
  
"Sarah," Jesse mumbled and reached for the door, but was stopped by Steve´s huge figure stepping in his way. Startled, the smaller mann stumbled back, all trust as faintly as it had been, fading away from his eyes.  
  
"Who are you seeing there?" Hapgood asked calmly.  
  
But the moment was gone. Suspiscious, Jesse turned to cast a despising look on the Englishman. "Let me go."  
  
Before anyone could say a thing, Dr. Hapgood firmly shook his head. "No."  
  
"You can´t do this. I´m a ..."  
  
"Who are you seeing outside, doctor?" Hapgood interrupted him.  
  
Jesse´s eyes narrowed. "Why do you want to know?"  
  
Hapgood smiled innocently. "Why don´t you want to tell me?"  
  
"You might hurt her."  
  
"Why would I?"  
  
Jesse opened his mouth to reply, but caught a glance from Mark, and quickly closed it again. His gaze grew even more distrustive, paranoid. "Let me go," he said again, almost threatening.  
  
"Let me go!" he yelled as no one reacted. He even turned to face Steve, but once again backed away in fear, though the detective´s eyes were bright with sympathy and shock.  
  
"Jesse, please ..." Amanda started, but was once more interrupted by Hapgood´s raising hand. "No use in trying, Dr. Bentley," he said calmly, without taking his look of his patient, who was growing more agitated every second.  
  
"Dr. Travis, I´m going to give you a slight sedative now. So that we can get you to the "Apple Memorial" where we two will finally talk. Do you understand?"  
  
"No shots," Jesse said warningly and lifted his hands in defeat.  
  
"I don´t think you´ll go with us without one," Hapgood said friendly. "In that case, I don´t trust you. Besides, you will feel better afterwards. Believe me."  
  
"No shots," the younger man repeated fiercly and backed away from the psychiatrist, who´d produced a syringe from a table. But as he tried to flee, Jesse only bumped in Steve, who gently, but firmly got hold of his arm.  
  
"No! Let me go!"  
  
"Jess ..."  
  
But Hapgood had already injected the needle into Jesse´s arm, and almost instantly, the young man grew quiet. He swayed slightly when Steve released his arm, so that the detective steadied him again.  
  
"How´re you feeling?" Hapgood asked as he opened the door and helped Steve maneuver the drugged doctor outside onto the hallway.  
  
"Dizzy," Jesse replied drowsily.  
  
"Under this circumstances," Hapgood said and pushed the button for the lift, "dizzy is good."  
  
"Sarah," Jesse mumbled, frowning. "Where´s ... Sarah?"  
  
"Don´t worry," Hapgood assured him. They entered the lift. "Sarah´s gone home. She´s fine."  
  
"She was scared of you," Jesse stated. His eyes started to close. "I´ve to tell her that ..."  
  
"Oh, watch out!"  
  
But Hapgood wouldn´t have needed to call out, Steve had already been prepared to catch his friend, as he slumped against him, the drug kicking in with full, though obviously unexpected force.  
  
Casting an apologetic glance on the sleeping doctor, Hapgood sighed. "I´m not good with drugs."  
  
"Well, since you gave him too much of whatever," Steve growled, "you should be the one carrying him."  
  
"Beg your pardon? You´re twice my size. Besides, he´s your friend. Ah, there we are," he stated happily as the doors opened. "Come on, detective, follow me."  
  
"I was against this plan from the very beginning," Steve muttered under his breath, but obeyed, anyway. 


	10. Cookie Hell 10

I do have an apology, I really do! And it´s even a good one, honest. See, I moved to another town to start studying, and then my computer got baaaadly hurt during the act of moving and we had to heal it (poor thing), and then I always had to hike down to the net-café, and blah, blah, blah, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah ...  
  
You know what I´m talking about, right? But I´m back now and the end is near! It is, believe me! This is the chapter before the last and final one, and hopefully my computer won´t let me down again before that one´s up here, too.  
  
I´m still amazed at how great you guys are! Thanks for all the reviews, though of course I don´t deserve half of them. Thanks so much!  
  
And, yes, I´ve to admit - "A beautiful mind" inspired me a lot. Great observation skills you have there. GRIN.  
  
Okay, no more chitter chatter, let´s start. Disclaimers still the same, and, heyyyyyy, my Obst is back! Missed you so much, kid! (All of you who haven´t checked out "I owe you that" - do NOW or be sorry. Commercial break ends here.)  
  
Enjoy. (Oh, and, ah, sorry about the quotation. I think I didn´t understand it correctly, but you know which one I mean, anyway, right? Don´t sue me please.)  
  
  
  
"Lock ´em away, gimme the key,  
  
Quick, before anyone gets up.  
  
Gimme the key, throw it away,  
  
There we are. No one must know."  
  
( "Anyone can whistle")  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It took Steve Sloan exactly three minutes to find out that he didn´t like the "Apple Memorial Hospital".  
  
Amanda needed two minutes more.  
  
Mark didn´t think about wether or not he liked the place. He was busy pacing the floor of the waiting room a friendly nurse had sent them to when they´d arrived after Hapgoods phone-call.  
  
Two hours ago Jesse had with every right accused them of having tricked him into this situation. Guilty they all felt.  
  
Much more so when they entered the building and almost immediately heard their friend´s voice call out for help frantically.  
  
Avoiding to look at the other two, Steve had made a grim face, murmuring: "Seems like he´s waken up at last ..."  
  
The silence filling the waiting room now made the air almost unbreathable. In an unconscious rhthym, the team sighed one after the other from time to time.  
  
"Dad, will you please sit down!" Steve groaned when it was his turn to sigh. "You´re driving me cra ..." Biting his lip, he hushed himself.  
  
Smiling slightly in sympathy, Mark walked over to a nearby chair and sat down with a deep sigh.  
  
As if that had been his cue, Dr. Hapgood entered the room, closing the door behind him gingerly, making Amanda think of how softly she´d used to close the doors when CJ had been a baby and finally asleep ...  
  
One great metaphor! She inwardly growled at herself and shook her head as though to clear it.  
  
Obviously exhausted, Hapgood sank onto one of the chairs in the room and rubbed a hand over his face.  
  
Out of a well-trained reflex, Steve immediately stood and placed a coffe- mug the friendly nurse had given him a while ago, in front of the tired- looking doctor, who smiled gratefully.  
  
"Thanks detective. Well," he sighed as if preparing for a battle to be faught, "your friend gave us some sort of a hard time here, but still I´d call it a successfull conversation. I´ve received enough infomation to make a first diagnosis. Pity though that we didn´t manage to dig into the history of his illness. He got ... agitated at a certain point ..."  
  
"We heard,"Mark said sadly.  
  
"Yes," the psychiatrist nodded. "I believe so did everybody else in the street." A short, grim twist of his mouth faded as he added earnestly: "We had to tie him to the bed to keep him from hurting himself - or us for that matter."  
  
As if to underline his words, he rubbed his left shoulder, then continued: "We´re not sedating him, though. Considering how much energy he wasted with that last outburst, I think he does that for himself, anyway."  
  
"He´d to do this to a patient the other day," Amanda suddenly said, gazing at Mark. "Tie her down mean. It ... it really bothered him."  
  
"Something in common we have there," Hapgood murmured, but didn´t look at her. Instead, he draw in a deep breath and began revealing what he´d found out while talking to his patient.  
  
"Well, as far as our conversation led us, I can tell now that he´s constantly seeing people who are not there. Just strangers. Patients maybe or just people on the street. Then there are the distressing hallucinations of dead people, which frighten him. Horrible as it may sound to you, we have to consider those visions normal for a person like him, though."  
  
"You mean a doctor," Mark said.  
  
"Right," Hapgood agreed. "An ER-doctor, too. Who´s confronted with death every day as a part of his job." His gaze changed to an almost poetic one as he explained: "It´s the old, deeply felt fear of failure that acompanies the doctor´s task. Don´t we all fear the ones we lost on our tables to return from the dead to haunt us? You know what I´m talking about, don´t you?" he adressed Mark, who nodded sadly.  
  
"See. It´s every doctor´s nightmare. And it´s coming true for Dr. Travis. As I understood it, he´s practically followed by them. To his apartment, his car, his job, everywhere. They actually do haunt him. I don´t have enough information to be completely sure, yet, but I´d count the dark figure he saw both times before getting hurt, to the dead crowd, too. It may even be death itself as he imagines it. But then ..."  
  
"Who´s Sarah?" Steve interrupted.  
  
"Yes, I come to that now. Besides the living and the dead crowd, there are four people he´s seeing on a regular basis and to who he established relation-ships of some sort. Firstly, there are his neighbors, the Crabtrees. They seem to be his friends. They don´t mean any harm to him, he speaks of them with genuine respect and affection. They even told him to look for help once his condition worsened. Psychologically speaking, they symoblize the sane part of Dr. Travis´ mind. The part who knows about his illness and wants to fight it.  
  
Then there is Sarah Shem, the little girl he saw outside the Doctor´s Lounge today. She is his fear. Very simply speaking, of course. His inner child, if you´d want to put it that way. A completely helpless and frightened person."  
  
"Shem?" Amanda asked, frowning. "Her name is Shem?"  
  
"Yes. Why? Do you know a person of that name?"  
  
"No. Just ... The author of a book I gave Jesse a few weeks ago is called Samuel Shem. But Jesse hated that book."  
  
"Because it scared him?" Hapgood guessed.  
  
"Ahm ... yeah, it ... sorta did."  
  
"Yes. That´s a typical behavior for people suffering from schizophrenia. Dr. Travis mixes reality and the emotions it rises with his hallucinations. The child is called like somebody who frightens him, and Mr. Crabtree´s name, for example, is Shay. I understood there once was a real Shay he knew?"  
  
The three listeners nodded in union.  
  
"See? He´s naming a fictional friend after a real one. And Faith, well ... Faith is what Dr. Travis believes to need right now. Faith in his own reality."  
  
Catching the doubtfull glances, Hapgood made an almost amused face. "Yeah, I know. From what I´ve learnt about Dr. Travis´ subconscious by now, I doubt he´d be a very good writer."  
  
Mark chuckled slightly, noticing with welcome relief that he still could do so. "Don´t let him know you said that," he advised.  
  
"I´ll be carefull. There is one person, though, who doesn´t fit into that pattern, and that is a woman called Oak." He made a short pause to cast all of them a questioning look, but no one gave any sign of recognizing the name.  
  
"She sort of follows him from time to time and gives him advises he blieves to be ... I think the word he used was "misleading"."  
  
They all had to smile on that choice of description. Jesse trying to sound very grown-up, it was.  
  
"He never mentioned her," Mark said and shook his head, as if he´d thought about it once more. "No. Though he did talk about Sarah and his neighbors."  
  
Hapgood shrugged. "He´s not actually fond of her. There is one striking thing about her which I think might be important, though. She kept telling him to not becoming afraid of people."  
  
"So?" Steve asked.  
  
"Well, after all it was his fear of the dead people or you that finally led to his illness being discovered by you, wasn´t it? So Oak´s advice was good. It seems like she wanted to safe him from ... this," he concluded with a very British smile. "Yet, Dr. Travis doesn´t trust her. In fact, he hates her. He told me he even attacked her once."  
  
"Jesse attacked someone?" Amanda asked in disbelief.  
  
"Ah ... no," Hapgood smiled. "Not someone, just ..." He made an amused face at her angry look and nodded.  
  
"Yes, he did. It´s not completely unexpected, though. Actually, schizophrenia can lead to paranoia and aggressions in some cases. You have to understand that Dr. Travis fears for his life. And, of course, he´s trying to defend himself. If he believes Oak to be a threat, he attacks her. It´s simple. Most people behave on a basis of simple logic."  
  
Ignoring Hapgood´s short turn to philosophy, Mark frowned. "Schizophrenia. But you can´t catch schizophrenia. You can´t even get it. It´s a physical illness."  
  
"Yes," Hapgood nodded. "It is indeed. Very good memory you have there, Dr. Sloan. I´m impressed. Dr. Travis suffers from an illness he probably had all his life."  
  
"What?!" Steve couldn´t keep himself from calling out. Since his chin had decided to fall down, anyway, he could at least verbalize his surprise, too.  
  
"You mean Jesse´s always been ... No. You´re wrong. I mean, sure, those ties he´s wearing always were some sort of a hint," he joked half- heartedly, "but ... You´re wrong, doctor."  
  
"You don´t want me to be wrong, believe me, detective," Hapgood replied friendly. "Because if I was, it would be a psychological illness, and that would mean your friend is a very sad, very lonely person who needs to create a reality of his own. He is not. He is sick. Something in his system is not working like it should, and that can be corrected."  
  
"But ..." Amanda came to Steve´s help, "we´ve known Jesse for years. He can´t be schizophrenic all his life. We´d have noticed. Wouldn´t we?"  
  
"Not if there never was any sign of it. He could very likely have had hallucinations for a very long time without befriending them. It´s not uncommon that schizophrenia reveals itself when the patient is in his twenties or thirties. See, children almost always have fictional friends. No one believes them to actually see them. And since I understood that Dr. Travis never had any experience with mind-expanding drugs, we have to assume that he really was born sick."  
  
"And you can prove that theory?" Amanda asked, regretting her tone immediately. "Have you run any test on him?"  
  
"Yes, Dr. Bentley, we have. I´m sorry, I know this must come like a shock to you, but it´s true. Your friend suffers from accute schizophrenia."  
  
"It is a shock," Mark nodded. "I´m sorry, we didn´t mean to accuse you of anything." He sighed, suddenly feeling dead-tired. "So what will you do? Shock-treatment, I guess?"  
  
"Right again. You prepared before coming here?" Hapgood smiled in sympathy. "Yes. We´ll start with shocks, three times a week. And then he´ll have to take pills for the rest of his life. There might be some difficulties in getting used to them at the beginning, but he eventually will be able to live amore or less normal life."  
  
"And ... will he be able to ..." Mark started but couldn´t bring himself to finish the question.  
  
Hapgood´s assuring smile faded as he concluded: "Work as a doctor again? Ahm ... that´s hard to tell at this point of ..."  
  
"That´s a no, right?" Steve interrupted him grimly.  
  
"Yes. He won´t. Well, not as a surgeon, that is. Not in the ER. But there are other fields of medicine. Psychiatry, for example."  
  
"Can we see him now?" Mark asked instead of keeping up the conversation.  
  
Understanding, Hapgood stopped immediately and nodded. "Yes. You should do so, anyway. He needs every support he can get now."  
  
"Yes. Thanks," Mark replied flatly and turned to leave the room.  
  
"We," Hapgood´s voice held him back, "will start the treatment tomorrow morning. It ... it might be helpfull if at least one of you could be with him then. Or maybe even ... I believe he still has parents, right?"  
  
"I tried to reach them," Mark answered. "But without any success. I´ll try again later."  
  
"Oh. So you take care of that then," Hapgood stated, sounding almost relieved. "Fine. Then - I won´t keep you from the patient any longer. He´s in room 203. You can´t miss it."  
  
"Right," Steve murmured. "We just follow the screams."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Fortunately, there were no screams to follow. Dr. Hapgood had been right; when the team entered room 203, they found their friend totally spent.  
  
His eyes sueezed shut, Jesse looked younger than ever, like a child fleeing from a nightmare. A cruel metaphor, Mark thought, for the last thing Jesse could do was to flee.  
  
Worried glances were exchanged among the visitors. What should they say? How to talk to a person tied to his bed? What to say on an occasion like this? You couldn´t just ask "How´s it going?" when you´d heard the adressed man screaming out in fear minutes ago. And you surely couldn´t say anything like ...  
  
"Nice room."  
  
At the two irritated gazes staring him into the ground, Steve Sloan shrugged apologetically, but said it was, and their friend flinched to open- eyed-consciousness.  
  
"Hey Jesse," Amanda hurried to say softly as the young doctor´s eyes opened. He calmed down soon, though, and helped them with following his example by not seeming afraid.  
  
"How´re you feeling?"  
  
"Like I´m tied to a bed in a looney bin," he replied quietly and made a face as if to show he was joking.  
  
Since he wasn´t, nobody laughed.  
  
"I´m okay now,"he added after a moment, but avoided to look into their eyes. "Not scared anymore. For now."  
  
"But you´re seeing them, aren´t you?" Mark asked.  
  
Sighing, the younger man nodded slightly. "Yes," he said quietly, drifting into a whisper. "They´re standing behind you. I can ... smell the blood."  
  
Hallucination or not, the idea of a bunch of zombies staring at their backs sent cold shivers through all three of the guests, and this time no one scowled at Steve for asking almost casually: "And the others? They´re here, too?"  
  
Casting his friend an amused look, Jesse shrugged half-heartedly. "Naw. Guess they don´t wanna be seen ´round here, y ´know."  
  
He rolled his eyes when a tensed silence followed.  
  
"Guys - kidding."  
  
Relieved, but nervous, Mark chuckled. Steve smiled, but still advised with a certain unease:  
  
"Perhaps it´d be good to lay down on the kiddig for a while, Jess."  
  
Preparing a reply, Jesse attempted to sit up, but fell back once his wrists connected with their bounds. Wincing at the sudden halt, he closed his eyes and sweared under his breath.  
  
When he looked at them again, he found his friends frowning at him with unbearable worry and embarrassment. Till then it had seemed as if he´d been a patient, lying in bed. Someone ill, someone being visited.  
  
Now he was a controlled adult. Someone sick, someone being started at.  
  
Remembering the sight of Mrs. Reed, he couldn´t help but smile grimly. His gaze wandered down, away from the uncomfortable pity in his friend´s eyes.  
  
"You look at me like I´m crazy," he stated with a humorless laugh. "But then last time I checked being locked away in a cookie jar and tied down okeyed to be looked at like that."  
  
There they were again on the very silent road, which always tended to take Steve to the most frightened part of himself.  
  
"You ... uh ... you need to rest now, right?" he said more than asked, but lamely for sure, and froze in the process of patting his best friend´s shoulder as if touching him would mean humbling him, damaging him.  
  
"So ..." he muttered and quickly drew his hand back, behind his back, far away from the patient.  
  
Though he knew and understood Steve´s feelings, Jesse couldn´t resist stating: "I´m crazy, you know. Not ill."  
  
"Still you ... ah ... you need some stuff ´ere, right? Like clothes and ... stuff. A-and somebody´s gotta check on the bar and ..." Catching his father´s gaze, Steve hushed himself down, but avoided looking at Jesse.  
  
He managed to hold out a moment longer, before he murmured his goodbyes and left.  
  
"Great," Jesse said under his breath and stared at his blanket.  
  
Worried, Amanda smiled gently. "Jesse, this was a pretty exhausting day, huh? Maybe it´d really be a good idea to give you some time to sleep."  
  
Jesse didn´t answer, but kept staring at nothing in particular. His hands had clenched to useless fists.  
  
Next thing you know you gonna be pinning me up in some psycho ward, Mark heard the young man´s voice echoing in his ear, strangely timeless and horribly real as this sentence was.  
  
The sudden urge to follow his son´s example clutched his stomach till he couldn´t help approaching the door ever so inconspicuously.  
  
Yet, Jesse noticed.  
  
"If you wanna leave, you ..." he started, stopped, swallowed hard, closed his eyes.  
  
Out of a reflex, Amanda turned to look behind her, only to find nothing. A nothing which was filled with horror as she knew.  
  
Hating her helplessness, she reached out to stroke his hair and offered: "We can stay if you want."  
  
"They won´t give me anything, will they?" Jesse asked instead of an answer.  
  
"No," Mark said, relieved that they ´d reached medical ground again. "It´s for your own good, Jesse. You´ll be given very strong sedatives tomorrow, before ..."  
  
"Yeah, `kay," Jesse cut him off, "a simple "no" woulda been enough. For today - we don´t mention that s-word involving an electrical socket again, alright?"  
  
"It´ll help you, Jesse," Mark assured in sympathy and touched the younger man´s shoulder. He found that it felt awkward, though. Jesse couldn´t in any way react to physical comfort, it felt wrong to touch a helpless man.  
  
He took his hand away in an instant.  
  
"I know," Jesse replied quietly, child-like, then added after a wince: "My nose itches."  
  
Funny, how a simple statement, a sentence of absolutely none importance, could tense up a whole room, Mark thought as he exchanged an uncomfortable glance with Amanda.  
  
Finally, the pathologist reached out to scratch the patient´s nose.  
  
"Better?"  
  
"No, you´re making it worse," he complained.  
  
"Steve´s right," Mark suddenly said, "we ought to get you some things here and I still have to make those phone calls."  
  
Relieved as he felt about finally leaving this terrible scenery, he still wanted the young man to know how much he cared, but found that he couldn´t do anything but give him a warm smile.  
  
"I´ll be back soon. And I´ll be here tomorrow. All the way. It´s going to be alright, my friend. You´ll see." God, how much he hated every lame word that was forced out of the unsufficient smile of his.  
  
"Thanks Mark." Jesse smiled back slightly, his expression a mirror to Mark ´s. "And, hey, thanks for tricking me in here. You were right, I´d never have told any of you about ... all this. It´s the right thing, I know that now. And ... what I said earlier ... I ..." he stuttered and peeked up into the older man´s eyes.  
  
A bright proud smile calmed him down, and Mark went without any further unnecessary words.  
  
"Amanda," Jesse murmured when she reached for her coat, too.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Uhm ..." He made a short pause, before asking almost in a whisper: "Don´t leave me alone. Please."  
  
A worried frown crawled over her face, but she remained silent, sensing how hard it was for him to ask.  
  
"Don´t ... don´t leave me alone with them. I don´t think I can bear ..." He stopped, biting his lip.  
  
Still silent, she lay back her coat and drew a chair next to the bed to sit by her friend.  
  
"I´m scared." He didn´t look at her. "I´m so scared."  
  
"It´s okay," she soothed. "I´m here. I´ll stay. No one´s going to harm you. And tomorrow they´ll start your treament. Which is scaring. No one expects you to not be afraid of shocks, Jesse. But you´re not facing this alone."  
  
"No, I know. I invited Faith and Shay to come over and watch," he replied and smiled humorlessly. "I also wanted Sarah to see it, but Faith said she´s too young for excitements like that."  
  
Amanda laughed softly and stroke his hair. Other than the Sloans, she found it hard to not touch him. As far as she was concerned, it felt wrong to just stare down at him like he was an animal under observation. He couldn´t chose wether to physically ask for comfort or not.  
  
Besides, she desperately wanted him to feel something right. Contrasting with the restrains, which without a doubt were hurting him by now.  
  
"They ´ll never forget, will they?" Jesse suddenly asked, and Amanda found herself at the end of a glance after so long a time.  
  
"Who?"  
  
"Steve and Mark. They ´ll never forget this, huh?" A Jesse-smile rushed over his features, leaving a shadow of bitterness behind.  
  
"They ´re more scared than I am, I guess. I mean - I would be, too. If it was Steve lying here, I wouldn´t ... I couldn´t ..." He sighed deeply before finishing: "I wouldn´t be able to ever look at him in a normal way again, too."  
  
"It´s not that, Jesse," Amanda said firmly. "You know that."  
  
"Yes it is. I saw it in their eyes."  
  
"How? You didn´t look there."  
  
That brought a slight smile to his lips as he nodded in admission.  
  
"Try to understand them, Jesse," Amanda continued. "They can´t do anything for you now. It´s all up to Hapgood and yourself. That´s hard to accept. For a cop and especially for a doctor. That you should know."  
  
A mixture of a wince and a smile twisted his mouth as he thought about her words.  
  
"Yet I´m ... scared. I´m scared that I might ... lose you," he told after a moment, again looking away. "All of you. I mean ... Gawd, I can´t believe this is happening. I´m losing my mind. Scratch that, I lost my mind!"  
  
"Jesse," Amanda soothed and once again stroke his hair gently. "That´s nonsense, and you know it. Hey, you acted crazier before and we never deserted you, right?"  
  
"Wow," he grinned. "You should have stick to psychology."  
  
"Naw, this is nothing. I´m a woman, remember? We can handle things."  
  
"No kidding."  
  
There was a friendly silence to follow, which Amanda used to continue stroking Jesse, who gazed away.  
  
It was just then he noted for himself how terribly instable he actually felt. Still fearing his treatment, his hallucinations, the possibility of losing his friends, he felt threatened, angry, relieved and sad at the same time without knowing how to express just one of his various emotions.  
  
His body knew, though, and answered his question by simply sending a tear, then another one, down his cheeks. In the unconscious motion of lifting his hand to wipe them away, he was once more stopped painfully by the restrains.  
  
Startled, Amanda took her hand off him and watched in sympathy as he gave his bounds a violent jerk.  
  
"I hate this! I ..." He sniffed, adding in an embarrassed whisper: "I can´t even hug you."  
  
It tore her heart to see him like this, struggling uselessly, just out of the urge to at least try, and she surprised herself as she calmly said:  
  
"But I can hug you."  
  
"No, you can´t," he answered and smiled bitterly. "At least now I know how it feels like. Won´t do this to a patient again. What goes around ..." He interrupted himself, his attention being drawn to the other side of the bed.  
  
"Hey honey," he said friendly and explained: "Sarah´s here." He paused. "She says hi."  
  
Somehow his casual tone reminded Amanda of CJ´s invisible friends he used to have when he´d been younger, and out of a well-trained reflex she said: "Hi Sarah!" and even looked into the direction the little girl was supposed to be.  
  
Jesse laughed out loud. "Maybe it´s a good thing you didn´t become a shrink, after all," he mused.  
  
Though she felt it her duty to make a face it him, she enjoyed hearing him laugh.  
  
His eyes still sparkling, he turned once more to smile at his little invisible guest reassuringly. He even opened his mouth to reply something, but closed it quickly when remembering that he wasn´t alone.  
  
"You know," he told Amanda, "it it wasn´t for... them, it´d be ... good. Honest. Faith and Shay. And Sarah." He smiled warmly. "They might just be my brain making fun of my senses but I like them."  
  
Glancing at him in concern, Amanda reached forward, bent down and hugged him as good as she could.  
  
"This is real," she whispered into his ear. "We are real, Jesse."  
  
"I know," he said, surprised by her reaction.  
  
Yet she didn´t release him for quite a time as if he could slip through her fingers like air and become like his other friends if she let him go.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"D´you wanna talk about it?" Mark asked his son when they sat in the car, driving to Jesse´s apartment. They hadn´t talked much since they ´d left the hospital, and Mark was feeling like he would chocke on the tension if they didn´t start to soon.  
  
"Nope," Steve replied shortly without taking his gaze off the street.  
  
"Well, I do."  
  
"Don´t let me stop you."  
  
"Steve."  
  
"What? I don´t wanna talk about it, okay? I don´t wanna think about it. I wanna drive down this damn street now."  
  
Pause.  
  
"It was terrible seeing him like this."  
  
"Dad, if you´re that crazy about walking, just say it."  
  
"I feel guilty. I mean, I know I´m not, but still I feel like I should have known. I should have done something. - Do you feel guilty?"  
  
"I know what you´re trying to do here, but I´m not falling for it. I´m not gonna stop with squeezing brakes in the middle of the street and shout at you, ´kay? Forget it. I don´t wanna talk about Jesse, and I don´t wanna hear you do it."  
  
"The sound of him screaming when we arrived ... I don´t think I´ll ever forget this."  
  
"If that´s what you call a psychological trick, maybe we should drive back to Hapgood to ..."  
  
"Steve, for Christ´s sake, I´m trying to talk to you here!" Mark exploded. "I don´t care if you refuse to, I will tell you how I feel, want it or not. Because I am feeling awful!"  
  
Dismayed, Steve stopped at the side of the street and leaned back, staring at his father.  
  
"Dad ..."  
  
"He´s my friend, too! If you wanna play tough cop, that´s fine, but I can´t. I´m a doctor. I should have known." Frustrated, Mark rubbed his hands over his face, then looked at his son. "I should have notice something."  
  
"You did. It was you who found out. You ..."  
  
" ... tricked him," Mark concluded. "Like I always do. Like every time I catch a murderer. I set him up. I would even understand it if he hates me now."  
  
"Dad, Jess couldn´t hate you if he wanted to. Besides, you said he thanked you for setting him up. There´s nothing to feel guilty about."  
  
"Remind me of that tomorrow, when I´m going to watch them sending electric shocks through his brain."  
  
"It´s a treament, Dad, and it´s necessary. - Why do I have to do the medical yelling?!"  
  
That sent a smile to Mark´s lips, which faded over the sentence: "We shouldn´t have gone."  
  
That was a sore spot on Steve´s conscience, and it took him quite an effort to say assuringly: "We´ll be there tomorrow."  
  
"He´ll be out cold then. He needed us now."  
  
"So why didn´t you stay?"  
  
"I couldn´t bear the sight."  
  
"Me neither," Steve said grimly. "He looked like a prisoner. Like ... like we´ll never get him back. Scared me to hell. Even more than that night he was afraid of me."  
  
They sat in silence for a few moments, before Steve suddenly asked: "You didn´t just trick me, too, did you?"  
  
"Maybe. A little."  
  
"I knew it. I knew it all along."  
  
"Course you did, son. And now drive on, I want to be back before he´s asleep."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Huh, huh, huh ... didn´t I see that before?"  
  
Dr. Amanda Bentley frowned at what met her eyes under the microscope.  
  
Behind her lay the late Mr. Dillard, stitched close after having been opened and examined.  
  
"What is this?" Amanda added, but didn´t receive an answer from her guest, whom she cast a questioning glance.  
  
Amazing, how peaceful even a person who´d shot himself looked when dead, the pathologist thought with a wry smile, but rubbed her eyes tiredly a second later. Great, she was so exhausted, she was getting macabre now.  
  
Glancing at her watch, she sighed once more. Now they were probably preparing him for the first shock , gave him a shot or two, brought him into another room, checked on the instruments...  
  
She shook her head. This was no good. Out of nothing to do she once more looked into the microscope, but whatever it was she saw there, it hadn´t decided to change into something she recognized.  
  
"Dr. Bentley?" a male voice from the door announced after a faint knock.  
  
"Yes?" she asked and turned.  
  
"Miller. Mail. Here are the test results from Boston."  
  
"Really?" she asked and grinned.  
  
"Ah ... yes," the young man nodded uncertainly, eyeing first her then the envelope in his hand suspisciously. "I´m sorry if they´re too late. It´s not my faul ..."  
  
"Mr. Miller, your timing is brilliant. You should consider being promoted."  
  
"Ah ... Ma´am?"  
  
"Never mind. Thanks very much." She smiled friendly and opened the envelope. She froze in motion, though,when she still sensed his presence behind her.  
  
"Anything else?"  
  
"N-no." The young man swallowed. "Is ... is he really ..." he stuttered, glancing at the body on the table.  
  
"Since I removed all his inner organs, weighed them and put them back into him afterwards, I guess if he wasn´t dead before, he is by now."  
  
Despite his greenish expression, Miller muttered an impressed "cool" before he finally forced his gaze away from the corpse and left.  
  
Shaking her head in amusement, Amanda smiled at Dillard. "Did you know that? Dead´s in now."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"What d´you mean, we can´t see him?" Steve Sloan was upset.  
  
"I´m sorry, detective,"Dr. Hapgood said apologetically, "but Dr. Travis is already under sedation. It takes a while to prepare a patient for a shock treatment. You can watch from the window up here," he pointed at a nearby door, which led to a small terrace above the examination room from where relatives, students and doctors could witness shock treatments.  
  
"We´ll start in ten minutes," he added after checking his watch.  
  
"But ..." Steve started, but was interrupted by an assuring hand placed on his shoulder.  
  
"Come, Steve, let´s go in there. It´s all we can do."  
  
Grumbling, Steve obeyed and turned.  
  
"Ah, you know," Hapgood´s voice hold him back. "I know I said this before - twice, if I´m right, but ... We´re gonna heal your friend, detective, not kill him."  
  
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. I´m sorry."  
  
"No, I really want you to understand this," Hapgood insisted. "For your friend´s sake. If you behave like this was the terrible part of his illness later on, you´ll endanger the healing process, ´cause he won´t come here again. This is a treatment, not torture. The fifties are over."  
  
"I know," Steve shot back, but calmed down immediately, adding slightly embarrassed: "I´m sorry, doctor."  
  
"You don´t have to be." Hapgood smiled. "I hear this all the time. I bet your father knows what I´m talking about."  
  
Smiling understandingly, Mark nodded. Yes, to help seldomly looked the part. Doctor´s knew.  
  
"´kay," Hapgood interrupted the short silence. "I better go check the room now. See you afterwards."  
  
With that he turned and left.  
  
Steve and Mark entered the watching-room. What they saw beneath them was a simple looking, small room with a bed in it, on which Jesse lay, completely still, once again restrained, but seemingly peaceful, as if sound asleep.  
  
A bunch of nurses was busy doing various check-ups, and soon afterwards, Dr. Hapgood entered, looked up to the Sloans with a smile, then turned all his attention to his patient, checked his pupils and breathing.  
  
Shooting an uncomfortable glance at his father, Steve nervously shifted his weight from one foot to another.  
  
"Steve ..."  
  
"No, no, no, it´s okay." He let out a deep breath.  
  
"Maybe we should sit down," Mark suggested friendly.  
  
"Naw, I got the sudden urge to move a little," Steve replied sarcastically.  
  
Knowing his son to well to go on with that, Mark sat down, hoping it would drive Steve to follow his example.  
  
But the detective remained where he stood at the window glass, staring down at the scenery beneath him which was about to change.  
  
All preparations done, the treatment started and was over in a second.  
  
The shock itself was given with one simple movement by Hapgood and only had a sudden but expected jerk of the limp body as a result.  
  
"Hey, that wasn´t ..." Steve started, but couldn´t finish his thought. "Oh god ..."  
  
"He´s reacting, son. That´s normal."  
  
"Uh ..."  
  
It looked about as normal as a choking fit, Steve thought. Jesse´s body wriggled and struggled against itself, against his own muscles responding to a stranger´s orders. His hands unclenched and clenched, his face was twisted in pain.  
  
But the most terrible sight of all were the stoic expressions of the nurses holding him down. Since they knew soothing him would have been of no use at all, they didn´t even attempt to do so.  
  
Bizarr, it looked. Morbid.  
  
It reminded Steve of his childhood holidays on farms, when hens and roosters had been killed and still moved after their death. The farmer would hold them down untill the spasms of death would subside ...  
  
With two steps, the detective was out of the room, leaving his startled, yet not surprised father behind.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A few hours later, Amanda was greeted by a tired and questioning looking Mark Sloan when arriving at the beach house.  
  
"So, what´s the emergency?" he asked and closed the door behind her.  
  
"I´ll tell you," she answered. "How ... did it go?"  
  
"Great. - Well, about as great as such things can go, I guess," he added with a wry smile. "Hapgood seemed satisfied."  
  
"Did you see him afterwards?"  
  
They entered the living-room, where Steve sat and nodded a short hello. "Yes," he answered the question, "we did, but only for a minute or so. He was in recovery and still pretty out of it. They said he´ll be for the whole day now."  
  
"Ah," she made, and when finding that there was nothing else to say, sat down. There was a short awkward pause, before the pathologist opened her mouth, closed it and was prevented from repeating the gesture by Steve´s unpatient : "It was terrible, okay?! So - what did you find out about Dillard that´s so important?"  
  
Team-mode kicking in, all of them changed their sitting-positions and gazes, curiosity and attention on the case taking over now. Relieved they all were, though, to have found something they could work on together. A distraction. A case.  
  
"It´s not only about Dillard," Amanda started, "but also Pinter."  
  
"Pinter?" Steve repeated surprisedly. "The guy who shot Seamus Zeesley?"  
  
"And himself," Amanda added. "Like Dillard did. D´you remember the strange test results I got from Pinter? I sent them to Boston."  
  
"Yeah," Mark nodded.  
  
"Huh?" Steve frowned. "You told me you didn´t find anything."  
  
"When you asked me about drugs, right. And I didn´t. This ... thing was found after the toxic test. And it´s no drug."  
  
"You said it was some sort of capsule," Mark remembered.  
  
" "Sort of"´s the word," Amanda said. "It was a nanobot."  
  
"A what?!" Steve and Mark asked in union and then seperately: "What´s a nanobot?!" (coming from the non-physician) and "Nanobots aren´t used yet."  
  
"One was used on Pinter," Amanda objected and turned to Steve to explain: "A nanobot is a very, very,very, very, very incredibly small robot."  
  
"My Latin´s not that bad!"  
  
"You asked. Anyway, they ´re injected into a patient and ... Well, you could say they operate on him."  
  
Steve blinked.  
  
"They ´re programmed," Mark helped out, "to do a specific task. Like stitch an inner gash or something like that. They do inside the patient what a human doctor could only manage by opening him"  
  
A confused grin crossed Steve´s lip. "Ah ... guys, that´s sciene fiction."  
  
"It was," Mark corrected. "Nanobots are real. But they ´re still experimental. There are no records of them ever having been used on a human. And most of the animals they used them on died. They´re very, very experimental."  
  
"Well, the two humans we know of who were injected with nanobots died, too, so your information are still update," Amanda said sarcastically.  
  
"Two?" Steve frowned. "Dillard?"  
  
"Yes. I found the remains of a nanobot in his sytem, too. - You can´t imagine how upset the specialists in Boston are. They ordered me to send Pinter´s body to them immediately. You know what a scandal this is?"  
  
"It´s not very hard to imagine," Mark said. "And if it really were nanobots, then we don´t have two suicides, but ..."  
  
"Murders," Steve concluded.  
  
"Right."  
  
"Right."  
  
"But why?" the detective asked, more himself than the others. "Who would ..."  
  
"Experiments maybe," Mark suggested. "But no matter what the motives were, they were those of a doctor, that´s for sure."  
  
"Okay," Steve said, his tone becoming cop-like. "I wanna know everything about those two men. You go back to the hospital and gather every chart you have on them, alright? I´m gonna drive to the precinct and try to find out some non-medical stuff about them. We´ll meet at the hospital."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"Who would do such a thing, you figure?" Amanda asked seriously when she and Mark sat in her car.  
  
"I don´t know. But whoever it is, he probably believes he´s right."  
  
"Right?"  
  
"Medical advance, Amanda."  
  
Remembering, Amanda sighed. "Doctor´s play God, huh?"  
  
"Some do," Mark nodded, knowing what she was referring to. "Even more than others," he added bitterly.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Here it is," Steve announced when they sat in the Doctor´s Lounge later. He hold up the file he´d searched for and told the rest of the team what he´d found out.  
  
"Pinter and Dillard were both operated six month ago. By the same surgeon at the same hospital."  
  
"What´s the surgeon´s name?" Mark asked and took the file from his son.  
  
"Dr. O. Reddick," Steve answered. "But she left the hospital soon afterwards and turned to psychology."  
  
"Psychology?" Amanda repeated and stated after a moment´s thought: "Both nanobots blocked a way of message from parts of the brain to others."  
  
"Both men went crazy," Steve translated for himself.  
  
"But they both never had psychological treatments. They both never showed any sign of mental instability before," Amanda continued and placed a file back on the table. "Why use it on them? Why not on patients who would need it? Who it could actually heal?"  
  
Since no one knew the answer to that, silence settled, till Mark´s mutter interrupted it.  
  
"There has to be something else. Something they had in common."  
  
"But what?" his son asked.  
  
"Something simple. I think they weren´t chosen because of any illness, but because ... hm ..."  
  
His gaze flew back to a file which he´d read before and which he now picked up again. "5´5."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Pinter´s size," he explained. "5´5. How tall was Dillard?"  
  
"Ah ..." Steve quickly searched for the information and read: "5´6."  
  
"Not very tall," Amanda stated.  
  
"They both weren´t," Mark said and exchanged a glance with his son.  
  
"Come on, Dad! Reddick chosed them because they were small?"  
  
"If it was Reddick," Mark said, "I think so, yes. She didn´t use the nanobots on them because of them, she did it for herself. It meant something to her that they were small."  
  
A short pause followed again, till Steve´s gaze suddenly changed into a dreadful frown. "You know, ahm ... Jesse´s sorta small, too."  
  
Mark looked at him in dismay, when Amanda´s voice sent cold waves through both of them.  
  
"Oh my god," she whispered. "Did you see Dr. Reddick ´s first name in here?"  
  
"No," Steve answered and felt an ice-cold hand inside his stomach. "Why?"  
  
"It´s Oak. Dr. Oak Reddick."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"You remember the morning I found Jesse at "BBQ Bob´s" right after Shay Zeesley´s death?" Steve asked as they sat later in a room they´d occupied at the precinct in order to check on Dr. Oak Reddick.  
  
"Course."  
  
"I think that was when he´d met Oak. Hapgood said, she warned him of becoming afraid or trusting people and she´s the only Harvey not fitting in."  
  
"Very good, Steve," Mark nodded. "She must have known about Pinter and Dillard and she..."  
  
" ... checked on Jesse," Steve finished. "But why? Why inject him with this thing and then worry about his condition?"  
  
"I think the answer´s in here," Amanda said and looked up from a file she´d been reading in. "She´s a surgeon, but turned to psychology after her brother, Greylen Reddick, slipped into a coma a few years ago. He was suffering from schizophrenia. Oak tried a new, very risky operation on him, but failed. She then quitted surgery and devoted herself to research."  
  
"How tall is Greylen Reddick?"  
  
"It doesn´t say here, but Oak´s 5´4."  
  
"Her brother´s probably equally small. There we have our motive."  
  
"Oh ... What´re you saying, Dad, she uses her inventions on men who remind her of her brother?"  
  
"Because she couldn´t safe him, yes," Mark nodded. "She can´t stop trying."  
  
"That´s it. No more Hitchcock for you."  
  
"No, it´s good," Amanda objected. "Yesterday Jesse said that if it wasn´t for the dead people and us, it wouldn´t be that bad to ... be like that. Greylen was born ill, so we can assume that Oak has it, too. And if she suffers from the same symptoms ..."  
  
"She chose to live with them. But Greylen´s her "if it wasn´t for" she can´t let go." Mark shook his head sadly. "Jesse probably met her when she came to see Pinter. Another "brother" on whom she´d failed. She was desperate and lost and once again recognized her brother in a man just because he was ..."  
  
"Small," Steve and Amanda concluded in union.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Wow," Steve said and then there was nothing more to say. The team sat in dismay.  
  
"That was the reason for Hapgood´s test results," Amanda stated suddenly. "It´s a nanobot."  
  
"And at "BBQ Bob´s", that was no hangover, it was ... the aftermath of the injection," Steve smiled without any humor. "That was why he forgot how he´d got there. Right?"  
  
Mark nodded. "Yes. And that was when it started. When Faith and Shay moved into his building and Sarah became his patient ... God, how couldn´t we notice?! How could we fail to see all that? I yelled at him that day!"  
  
"I shook him," Steve said in a sad, small voice, child-like.  
  
He found his way back to a very adult tone quickly enough, though. "I can´t believe I accused him of being hungover and leaving the bar open. I mean, gee, it´s Jesse! I should have known better! Every time we think he´s crazy, we´re wrong! We should have learned by now."  
  
"Steve, we ..."  
  
"What?! Don´t tell me that´s not exactly what you think, too."  
  
Mark fell silent again and bowed his head. Of course it was.  
  
"We let him be shocked," Amanda suddenly said, calmly, clearly.  
  
The silence following was unbearable. It was filled with chocking guilt and memories of the kind one never forgets.  
  
"We won´t let it happen again," Steve said when he couldn´t hold out longer. He needed to breathe. "Come on, we´ll get him outta there."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
They didn´t. Couldn´t.  
  
"What?!"  
  
Because he wasn´t there anymore.  
  
"You´re wrong, please check again." Steve tried to smile friendly, but only managed to look even more threatening than before. The poor nurse at the reception desk at the "Apple Memorial Hospital" flinched under his gaze and quickly scanned the screen of her computer.  
  
Behind the detective´s back, his father and Amanda exchanged a concerned glance.  
  
"I´m sorry, sir. Dr. Travis has left. See - he signed out here."  
  
"Signed out?! How? Last time we saw him he couldn´t lift his head, let alone hold a pen! How could he possibly sign himself out - he can´t even walk!!! He was shocked this morning!!!"  
  
He only noticed he was yelling at the poor girl, when Mark´s calming hand patted his shoulder.  
  
"Uh, I´m sorry," he apologized and earned a forgiving, yet frightened smile from the nurse.  
  
"It´s alright," she squeezed out. "You´re worried, I understand. But I can´t help you, Dr. Travis is no longer Dr. Hapgood´s patient."  
  
Mark frowned. "Why ´s that?"  
  
"His psychiatrist took the case from him. She signed all the necessary papers ... here, see?"  
  
The team grew very pale.  
  
"She?" Mark asked dreadfully. "Did she take him with her?"  
  
"Yes," the girl replied innocently, having absolutely no idea of the horrible meaning her words had. "She said she´d continue his treatment under her observation."  
  
"Dr. Reddick?" Steve asked and closed his eyes against the postive answer.  
  
"Do you wish to talk to Dr. Hapgood?" the nurse asked, obviously eager to help, but was rewarded with ignorance. 


	11. Cookie Hell 11

DONE!!! Yeah! Double-Yeah! I´m done!!! What a feeling! And, yeah, I know, it took me some time again, but ... Ah, it´s my computer´s fault! Sue him!  
  
`kay, time to say goodbye now, I guess. So, THANK YOU, you were so great with the reviews and all! I really, really, REALLY appreciated your great support, it was so much fun writing for you guys!  
  
Last special Double-Yeah thanks and Obst-greetings to StrangePenguin, my own private blooper-detective! Love you and your great work, kid! Keep it up! (By the way - last commercial break for "I owe you that"! Check it out! End of break.)  
  
Disclaimers still the same, don´t own anyone (Craps!), which might be better for some people´s health, anyway ...  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"The opposite of left is right  
  
The opposite of right is wrong.  
  
So anything that´s left  
  
Is wrong."  
  
( "Anyone can whistle")  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Awake. That he knew. He was awake.Or at least he believed he was. He could feel his eyes closed, cold breezes on his skin.  
  
Awkward, frightening it was, though, for he had absolutely no idea of what to expect. Where he should be was as much the question as where was he.  
  
Confusion. Dark, cloud-like confusion hang heavily over his head, pushing it further down, till he could feel his forehead touch his knees.  
  
He tried, but he couldn´t open his eyes. Yet, he could see.  
  
"Oh no," he groaned in desperate frustration, when the interpretation of the images reached his mind. "Not you. You were told to go! Get lost! The mortuary is closed!"  
  
But they didn´t go. Obviously they had used his temporary weakness to sneak inside his head. And now they stared at him from the wrong side of it.  
  
Great, he thought, so was that really worth it?  
  
The sentence hadn´t been finished, when, suddenly remembering, he frowned. It? "It" that had happened before ... He´d fallen asleep. No, he´d been forced to sleep. Drugged, so that he could be ...  
  
Ever so easy now, his eyes snapped open in shock, cause shocked he had been. Shocked. In a hospital.  
  
And though his had hadn´t ached before, it did now as if it knew it was supposed to be considering what had been done to it earlier.  
  
Earlier. Earlier when? Earlier where? Where was he, anyway? He could make out a blur of white, dim light in a room, a window, high up above, blue sky outside.  
  
Trying to shake off the dizziness, he blinked repeatedly, which only led to increasing the pain in his head. He moaned, closed his eyes for a brief moment, and found it hard and painfull to reopen them.  
  
As his senses awoke delayed to himself, he now took in more and more of his surroundings.  
  
A moment later he noticed for the first time that he couldn´t move his hands to rub his eyes. A dull, heavy feeling avoided it, alright, aftermaths of the shock, but something else, too. He could clearly feel by now, that they were hold in place behind his back, forcefully, not without pain, too. Concentrating on it, he felt rough ropes, sharply cutting into his wrists.  
  
That was a little rude a treatment for a hospital, wasn´t it? What sort of recovery should that be? Had he done something that irritating while out, he mused and tried hard to remember, but, of course couldn´t. But coming to think about it, or better being now in a more apropriate condition to think at all, he noticed that wherever he was had not even the slightest resemblance with the hospital.  
  
It looked more like a cellar. Damp. Cold. Far away.  
  
He was about to ask for anyone else being there, when a sudden movement behind him startled him. He tried to look around for it, but stopped immediately when pain shot through his head.  
  
"It´s me," he heard a female voice call out softly behind him. "Sorry I startled you. I didn´t notice you were awake."  
  
Before he could reply anything, though he wouldn´t have known what, he felt the ropes at his hands being tightened even more and gasped in pain.  
  
"Oh, sorry," the voice said apologetically. "Too thight? Ah ... sorry, but I don´t think I can do anything `bout it. You´ll get used to it."  
  
While speaking, she stood and turned around his form, so that he could see her now.  
  
"Uh-uh," he stated, his eyes widening a little. There was a short, embarrassed pause, before he added, much calmer than he felt:  
  
"Wow, it went wrong, huh? I´m lying in a coma, yes? Dreaming. Yeah, that´s it. I´m dreaming. And of course it´s no nice "What would the world be without me?"-dream in which I find out it would be hell on earth, no, it´s a freaked out "a Psycho-Harvey kidnaps me and ties me up in a cellar"- dream."  
  
"You know, you´re not dreaming, aren´t you?"  
  
"Don´t say that, Oak. I mean, hey, there are you and three dancing zombies in this room, and you´re saying it´s no dream?"  
  
"They dance?"  
  
"Funny doesn´t suit you now," he shot back, a nervous laugh escaping him. "You´re really real?"  
  
"Surprise," she said without any humor in it. Frustrated even. Nervous she looked. Shy.  
  
"Oak, this is not funny. See, I´m supposed to get healed here. There´s no place for you up here anymore. Go."  
  
She didn´t move. And he didn´t believe his words.  
  
"Okay, so if you´re no hallucination, but a sick psycho having used me for some highly immoral experiments, you´re of course invited to stay."  
  
"I´m sorry," she said in a very small voice. "I´m so sorry."  
  
He didn´t want to realize, but couldn´t help doing so.  
  
"Sorry," he said. "You´re sorry." He paused, shocked. There was no anger in his voice, when he continued: "How? What did you do to me?"  
  
"It´s hard to explain. It´s ... I didn´t inted to, Jesse, you gotta believe me. I really didn´t. I never wanted this to happen. None of this. I´m sorry!" she repeated firmly. "I am. I´m no monster!"  
  
"I didn´t say you were."  
  
"But you look at me like I was."  
  
"Ever considered that it might be you who projects a feeling onto ..."  
  
"Jesse!" she shouted at him, but fell a silent in an instant. "Sorry." Letting out a deep breath, she laughed slightly. "Oh god. Look at me. It´s you who ... Well, I shouldn´t be the one screaming, huh?"  
  
"Why not? You´re the psycho."  
  
"Just because I´m not letting you to become one," she replied. "I won´t let you do what they did. It won´t happen again because of me." Her gaze drifted off to a time she regretted. Caught in guilt, she didn´t hear him mumbling:  
  
"They? Who ... Oh ... Pinter and Dillard. That´s why ..." Fear written all over his face, he stared up at her. "What did you do? Why them?! Why me? Why ..." He hushed down, when one of the dead people still present made a threatening step towards him. Frightened, he closed his eyes.  
  
She didn´t notice. She hadn´t come out of the past, yet. Desperate, she bent down and grabbed the young man´s shoulders as if to cling onto them.  
  
"I´m sorry! Believe me, Jesse! I am. I wanted to safe you. But you were too happy. You liked them, didn´t you?" She smiled at his dismay. "Yeah, you liked them. That little girl and the others. They liked their ones, too. At first, till they got scared, like you. You all get scared. And then you ... I understand it, I do. But I can´t let you do what they did. I just can´t."  
  
"Why?" he whispered. "Why did you do this to me?"  
  
Being eye to eye to her victim, the broken young man she had created, she couldn´t bear, and looking down, she once more assured him and herself that she was "Sorry. I´m sorry, Jesse."  
  
With that, she stood and turned.  
  
Confused, he looked after her, then realization dawned.  
  
"No," he whispered in fear. "No, wait. Y-you ... You wanna kill me?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
Once more, he laughed out nervously, his eyes bright with fear. "Yes?! Yes as in no, right? Come on, Oak, yes is the wrong answer! It has to be "No, course not, Jess! Don´t be ridiculous! I´m a doctor! I could never ..." ...."  
  
He flinched, when she suddenly whirled back to face him, furious. "Don´t you dare!"  
  
"B-but it is ... what you´re plannin´ ..."  
  
"No!" she shouted. "I´m not! What d´you think I am, a killer?!"  
  
"Uh ..."  
  
"I´m not! I won´t kill you! I will ... leave," she added quieter. "Just leave."  
  
"Lea ..." he repeated, and suddenly realized the cruel, unbearable meaning of the words. "No!" he said in fear and couldn´t help his voice rising as he begged: "No! Don´t. Please. Oak! Don´t leave me here! Don´t leave me alone! Don´t leave me alone with what I see! Please! You can´t! Oak! You made me see them! You can´t leave me alone with them now!"  
  
She didn´t answer, but stood, her back to him, her head bowed, broken as well.  
  
And since he´d understood every word she´d said before, every desperate plea he´d seen in her eyes, the shadow of guilt so great it had washed her life away years ago, on her face, he thought he knew what to say to safe him from what he feared most.  
  
"Don´t become afraid, huh, Oak?!" he spat at her despitefully. "Don´t let the fear rule every move you make. Yeah, you´re one to talk! You never managed, right? Never! You´re just ..."  
  
Though it had been the plan, he still was surprised by the speed with which she managed to grab one of her high-heeled shoes and hit him with it hard across the temple.  
  
He fled into blissfull darkness, before the pain could reach him.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"Okay, she´s not a at her apartment, and she´s not in the hospital she works at," Steve stated when he entered the Doctor´s Lounge, where Amanda had greeted him with an agitated, questioning look.  
  
"Where´s Dad?"  
  
"Checking out Dr. Shaugnessy," she answered and added, avoiding his gaze, " a brain surgeon. He said he couldn´t bear sitting around and doing nothing a minute longer, so he decided to ... See, if we find Jesse, we need to get that thing out of him, and ..."  
  
"If we find him."  
  
"I didn´t mean that I don´t believe we´ll do. I just wanted to say that ..."  
  
"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I´m sorry," Steve sighed and sat down on the sofa heavily, resting his head in his palms.  
  
"We´ll find him," Amanda assured him.  
  
"Yeah. Sure."  
  
"Steve ..."  
  
A deep sigh cut her off, and knowing Steve, she didn´t try to dig into it any further.  
  
"I checked Hapgood´s test results," she said as if stating her discoveries considering a case. "He mailed them to me once he´d heard our story." She made an unconscious dramatic pause, before adding: "We were right. It´s a nano."  
  
"What d´you figure she´ll do to him?" he asked, not looking at her, though.  
  
"Stop him," Mark ´s voice announced from the door.  
  
The rest of the team present turned to him, frowning.  
  
"From doing what?" Steve asked.  
  
"From killing himself or - more important - others. She fears he´ll end up like the others."  
  
"But he was in a hospital," Amanda objected. "Under control. It´s illogical to ..."  
  
"Don´t logic her," Mark said wisely. "Remember, she´s sick. She´s probably believing they would have let him go after a few more shocks or whatever. Unhealed, of course. She´s trying to safe lifes, I think. But now in order to that, she has to kill for the first time. And that is the weak spot we have to relay on."  
  
He didn´t notice the others growing pale, till two whispered "Kill?" drew his attention back to them.  
  
"I believe so, yes," he nodded sadly. "She thinks she has to. Though hopefully she can´t bring herself to do it just yet. She´s hesitating, I´ve no doubt about that. But eventually, she will kill Jesse."  
  
"Oh god," Amanda breathed, and stood as if to start pacing, but just remained where she was.  
  
"She won´t do it personally," Mark continued. "She´s a doctor, a good one, referring to her vita. I don´t think she is able of actually killing a person by pulling a trigger or stabbing him or something like that. She´ll use something from the far."  
  
"Drugs," Steve suggested.  
  
"For example. Anyway, we´ve to find him soon."  
  
"I´m with you there, but where should we look? He could be anywhere."  
  
"Hmmm ..." Mark muttered and shook his head as if in slow motion. "I don´t think so. Insanity is based on easy patterns."  
  
"You´ve been around Hapgood too long."  
  
"Maybe," his father nodded, clearly not listening. There was this expression on his face the rest of the team had come to respect as the sign of the lightening striking behind it.  
  
And caring for his reputation, Mark didn´t disappoint them now, either.  
  
"I have an idea."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
This time he knew where he was. Memory slapped him right in the face the moment he was awkened by his own painfilled groans. Despite himself he felt his heart cheer out at the obvious fact that he was still alive, before he started to complain inwardly.  
  
If his head had ached before, now it proved agony to even think. The slightest movement sent arrows and spikes through every nerve and every cell, but holding it still was no better, for he still felt a heavy dullness wrapped around his whole body, forcing his head down.  
  
And that wasn´t even the worst part. The worst part he didn´t even find out about before he tried to open his eyes, as unwisely as it seemed.  
  
He hadn´t need to worry about the light-filled pain awaiting him, anyway, cause his eyes could not be opened.  
  
They were closed.  
  
Taped close.  
  
"Don´t leave me here with what I see," he heard his own words echoing in his ears.  
  
"That´s not funny!" he yelled, but received no answer. "Oak!"  
  
No response. She had gone.  
  
"No," he whispered pleadingly and once more rose his voice to a keening cry. "Oak! Oak, please!"  
  
It was of no use. She had left. He was alone.  
  
"No, no, no, no, no ..."  
  
Well, as alone as a man followed by death could be.  
  
"You´re not real! I know you´re not real. And, hey, you know something? You shouldn´t be here! You shouldn´t be anywhere near me! I got shocked, remember? I´m healed! Okay ... I´m getting cured ... Starting to get cured ... Well, yes, I´m obviously not cured at all by now, but ..."  
  
He flinched violently, when he felt something cold at his arm. He was still wearing his hospital clothes, white pants and a shirt, and was shivering from the cold.  
  
But that ... Had he imagined it? Had it been the wind? Or one of them?  
  
He could feel their presence. With every passing second, he could feel it more, hear her moans swelling up to screams.  
  
"Stop it," he begged and shook his head, ignoring the pain this provoked. He couldn´t cover his ears, which he so desperately wanted to, and on the contrary had to keep his eyes close, so that he couldn´t see from where they were coming, where they stood, how many of them were there.  
  
"Leave me alone!" he shrieked when one of them touched him again, ever so softly, but terrifying real as it felt.  
  
"Oak! - Okay, not real. Jesse, calm down. This is not real. `kay you sitting here is, but they are not! Oh gawd, please, somebody help me! Oak! Come back! Please! Aaah!" Another cold breeze brushed against his cheek, and he jerked his head away, hitting something behind his back.  
  
"Go away!" he screamed.  
  
But they didn´t. It seemed as if they´d waited for this very moment to come. The moment they were finally allowed to rise their voices, which they now did.  
  
"Oak!" he called out, till he couldn´t hear his own voice screaming over the dying cries of the dead.  
  
  
  
  
  
"Dad, when this thing´s over, please lay down the psycho stuff, alright? It´s making me nervous," Steve complained while banging the door of his car shut.  
  
Mark murmured something about his son needing vacation, and Amanda just kept on observing the building they´d just reached as if she´d never been there before.  
  
"So,let me get this straight, or better, let me try to get this straight once more," Steve said as they prepared to cross the street. "She, Oak, will come here somwhere in the not so distanced future, because ... No, wait, I can´t get it straight, ´cause I haven´t got it, yet."  
  
"See, that´s because you´re not a doctor. She took an oath and ..."  
  
"C´mon, stranger things have happened than ..." Steve objected unnervedly, but was interrupted by his father saying very convincedly:  
  
"I don´t believe she´s one of them. Remember her motive. She is obsessed by the idea of saving her brother´s life. She doesn´t want to harm anyone."  
  
"But now she thinks she has to," Amanda said.  
  
"Right. She has to kill Jesse."  
  
"Okay!" Steve couldn´t help but call out angrily. "You know, that was the part I got! So," he breathed out, calming himself down, slightly embarrassed by his outburst, "because she thinks ... you know, she will come here to Jesse´s apartment, because ... Ah, nope, still not with you there."  
  
"She needs to know it´s at least anywhere near okay to kill him," Mark stated, as he had before, twice even, on their way to Jesse´s apartment.  
  
"I thought you said she thinks he´s dangerous," Steve said frustratedly and reached for his gun, now that they ´d reached the building Jesse lived in.  
  
"Yes, but she made him that way."  
  
"So, what," Steve continued arguing, while mentioned them to stay behind him, "search his place for any sign of him being a bad person?!"  
  
"Exactly."  
  
"That´s crazy."  
  
"Now you got it, son," Mark said dryly.  
  
"I did? Great."  
  
At a wink of the detective, the team became very quiet, till they were inside and standing in front of Jesse´s apartment door.  
  
Glancing at his father as if for checking, Steve finally knocked at the door and announced themselves.  
  
"Dr. Reddick? This is Steve Sloan, LAPD. Please open the door."  
  
There was no answer from the inside, not even a noise.  
  
"Dr. Reddick! Please open the door," Steve called out again, and, when there was the same answer as before, cast a triumphant look on his father.  
  
At Mark´s innocent lifting of one brow, Steve sighed deeply and took a step away from the door, explaining to the silence in a montonous tone that he was "going to have to kick in the door if you don´t open it yourself, which I really would hate to do, ´cause my friend will certainly sue me if I´m going to damage his beloved door, but if you force me to ..."  
  
He almost fell forward out of pure fright, when the door suddenly opened and he was met by air - till he followed the other´s gazes down to the tiny, fragile looking person standing in front of them.  
  
"Dr. Reddick, I assume," Mark said calmly and stepped in front of his still startled son. "I´m Dr. Mark Sloan."  
  
"I know," she answered, her voice, though as tiny as her auter appearance, firm, in control.  
  
"Where is he?" Mark asked.  
  
"I can´t tell you."  
  
A cold wave rushed through all three of them at the sound of her voice. It was the sound of failure, of death. A broken woman, she was, more important, a broken doctor. She´d given up, knowing that she couldn´t win her fight.  
  
A decision that sentenced Jesse to death.  
  
"I´m going to take you to the precinct," Steve said, suddenly not feeling furious anymore. The urge to grab and ruttle the woman who had sent his friend through a cruel ordeal, was flown.  
  
There was nothing he could have say or do which could have meant anything to her. Beyond fighting with her, she finally had accepted the deep, desperate, dull hate she felt. Hating herself, yet knowing there was no way back nor out, she seemed to have stopped crying the moment she´d heard the detective´s voice outside. Now, she couldn´t cry nor beg nor apologize anymore, it was the price she had chosen to pay to free herself from her depts.  
  
Whoever looked into her empty, wide eyes felt like crying, though, as if at least someone should do it for her.  
  
"Let´s go," she said and outstretched her wrists.  
  
"That won´t be necessary," Steve said, his voice sounding as if coming from the distant. "Just follow us."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Hours had passed, Steve had begged, yelled, explained, begged again.  
  
Oak Reddick remained silent. It seemed as if one by one her human abilities had left her. She couldn´t cry anymore, couldn´t speak, how long would it take till she would just go limp at all, slipping into an unblissfull darkness of neightmares, in which she would be completely alone with herself. Nothing but her voice repeating over and over again what she had done, what she was.  
  
"Dr. Reddick. Oak," Steve started again after a short silent pause and rubbed a hand over his tired eyes. "You know this is wrong."  
  
How many times had he said exactly the same sentence now? He couldn´t remember.  
  
"We can help Jesse. We know what happened to him. What you did to him," he added in order to provoce her, a useless mission as he had found out earlier that evening. Yet, he couldn´t help trying it again and again and again. He´d almost fallen into a pattern, a rhythm of interrogation methods: scream, beg, argue. Scream, beg, argue. Scream, beg, argue.  
  
He was so tired, he could bearly hold onto this order, but unconsciously he knew that the minute he would give up, he would feel responsible, as if it was him who would pull the trigger.  
  
"Don´t you understand?" he asked, his voice rising in anger. "We can remove this thing. He doesn´t have to die. He can be healed and won´t kill anyone. He doesn´t have to die," he repeated firmly.  
  
Oak stared at him unimpressedly.  
  
Time to scream, Steve´s inner clock told him, and he jumped to his feat in a frustrated gesture, almost knocking over his chair. "Why does it have to be this way?! Why can´t you let him go? God, you´re supposed to be a doctor, but right now you´re nothing more than a killer. Plain and simple. And not even like the others, Dillard or Pinter or however more of them there were! They were manipulated! But you, you´re chosing to kill."  
  
She bowed her head, but didn´t defend herself. She´d heard those words so often in her own voice, they couldn´t hurt anymore.  
  
"And for what reason?!" Steve continued yelling furiously. "Because of what you did to him! Do you have any idea how much he suffered? Huh, do you, Oak? Did you see him huddled in a corner, too afraid to look around?! Did you see him begging for his life? - Yeah," he spat despitefull, staring down at her in faked disgust, "I believe you did."  
  
Her head shot up, her mouth had even opened a little at that accusion, yet it vanished as fast as it had appeared.  
  
But it had been there. In her eyes there had been defense. The detective knew he had to cling onto that.  
  
"Did you?" he asked calmer and looked straight into her once again emptying eyes. "Hm, maybe not. Maybe my father´s right after all and you are not able of killing. Maybe you just ... brought him somewhere and found that you couldn´t do it."  
  
Ever so slight as it was, it was there again. Pain. Defense. Hope.  
  
"Is that what you did, yes?" Steve continued to ask in a calm, yet firm voice. "Lock him up somewhere and throw away the key? Did he see you? Talk to you? Did he find out you were real all the time? Huh? Did he know that it was you who injected him with this thing? Did he know," he added and crouched down beside her to look directly into her eyes with an intensity that sent a noticable shudder through her body, "that he is not insane, never had been? Did you tell him," he added, his voice now merely a whisper, "that he was shocked because of you?"  
  
She swallowed, but didn´t look away. Eventually, he shrugged and stood up.  
  
"You know, Oak," he said before he left the room for a break, "when Jesse was in hospital, he said it wasn´t that bad, like, seeing people who´re not there. He even liked them, well, a few that is. He didn´t like you," he added wickedly, "but that´s a doctor´s instinct, I guess. Hm. Well, the reason I´m telling you this is ... I wonder what you see. What you will see."  
  
With that he left the room. Scaring emptiness full of demons remained silent behind the closed door.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
And silent it was in the other room full of demons, too. After having cried so much that he was horase by now, Jesse had given it up. Ignoring them hadn´t worked, though, and he was out of options, jokes and hope when Sarah´s hand gently brushed against his drawn, cold face.  
  
How long he´d sit there and had just begged for it to stop, no matter how, he didn´t know. It seemed as if there had never been a time without them. Never a time in which he had been free. Never a life. Never him.  
  
"You´re crying?" Sarah asked softly after he´d jerked away from her touch.  
  
"No," he croaked. "I´m not."  
  
"But I can see it on your face," she objected. "There," she added and touched his cheeks.  
  
"You´re wrong," he said. He couldn´t cry, the tears might whelm up in his eyes but had no way of getting out under the tapes. It seemed as if he´d never been able to see. Never eyes. Never beauty. Never safety.  
  
"I´m not," the little girl stated, cleary meaning that that was that, and sat down beside him. He could feel her head against his chin. "It´s cold in here," she said. "I don´t wanna stay. When do we leave?"  
  
"Soon."  
  
"They ´re scaring me," she whispered into his ear and huddled up against him.  
  
"Me too," he said. A low moan to his left made him swallow hard. "But I´m here, honey, it´s going to be okay."  
  
"I´m afraid," she said after a short pause, her warm presence suddenly gone.  
  
"Sarah?" he asked dreadfully and lifted his head into the direction her voice was coming from. "Honey?"  
  
"I´m going," she stated, clearly on her way out. "You´re coming, too?"  
  
"I can´t," he said desperately and tried the bounds without any success. "Sarah ... Please stay. Sarah?"  
  
"Stupid," she said casually, hardly audible. "Just stand up and come. See you."  
  
"Sarah!!!" he cried after her and had to caugh. A door banged shut. She was gone.  
  
"Sarah! Come back! Sarah! Come back, please! They won´t hurt you, I promise! We could play something! Sarah! Play?"  
  
But she didn´t come back. The moaning to his left got louder, he could feel a cold, cramped hand fall onto his shoulder and yelped in fright. It hurt to do so, though, and once again he had to caugh. Exhausted, he leant his head against the wall.  
  
A scream echoed through the room.  
  
Jesse flinched.  
  
The hand cramped around his shoulder, suqeezing it, then went. The low thud of a body falling to the ground followed.  
  
With all his remained strength, Jesse slammed his head against the wall. It hurt like hell and he felt even more ill than before afterwards. He didn´t lose consciousness, though.  
  
"Aw, this sucks," he murmured, but couldn´t bring himself to try again.  
  
As if out of disgust, sleep avoided the one who desired it so much.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"It´s no use," Steve said frustratedly and laid his head into his palms. "She won´t tell us where he is. I doubt she will ever talk again. If you want my opinion, this drove her over the edge. We lost her."  
  
"Maybe," Amanda said sternly, "but we didn´t lose Jesse."  
  
"I´m not so sure about that," Steve replied.  
  
Silence followed, not even Amanda had enough strength left to yell at him for saying a thing like that. Besides, she couldn´t yell at him for speaking out what she believed, too.  
  
"I am," Mark said convincedly. "He´s not dead yet. We still have the chance to save him. And if Oak won´t help us, we´ll find out ourselves."  
  
"How?"  
  
"Like we always do," he stated without any of the humor which normally accompanied that sentence. "By being clever."  
  
This time, however, no one jumped in relieved surprise in order to get it done. The team remained where it was.  
  
"He is alive," Mark said urgently.  
  
"How d´you figure that?" his son asked and finally looked up. "He´s been missing for eight hours now."  
  
"You don´t die within eight hours," Mark said. "You said yourself, that she probably just locked him up somewhere. She didn´t mention that he was hurt or ..."  
  
"Dad, listen to me, she didn´t say anything. Okay? I don´t know if he´s hurt. I don´t know if he´s alive at all. She didn´t tell me. She didn´t talk."  
  
"Hey," Amanda interrupted his outburst soothingly. "Mark is right. He´s alive. He has to be," she added and looked into the detective´s eyes.  
  
"Yeah," he finally nodded, his voice sounding older all of a sudden. "Yeah, right."  
  
"Okay," Mark stated as if glad that that was cleared out now. "So, where do we start?"  
  
"Maybe it´s right there, but we´re missing it, cause it´s so simple," Steve said, earning questioning gazes. "I mean, maybe he´s at her place. Maybe she wants to get caught. Like, you know, like unconsciously."  
  
"Ah ..." Mark made doubtfully, but smiled slightly at his son´s frustrated look. "Not very likely, but I´m glad you improved your psychological knowledge. - Anyway, you are probably right about one thing. It´s simple. Some place simple. Remember what stroke her about Dillard and Pinter. And Jess," he added hesitatingly. "Something that has only meaning for her. I think this is how we´ll find him. Let´s take a look at those files again."  
  
  
  
  
  
"There," Mark stated half an hour later, pointing at a sentence in the file he held in his hands. "Greylen Reddick´s adress."  
  
Steve frowned. "Why would she take Jesse there? She wants to safe her brother, but kill him."  
  
"Exactly. Actually, it´s Greylen´s fault."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"He can´t be cured. Can´t be safed. By accepting her guilt and killing Jesse, she also accepted that fact, I think. That´s what broke her at last," he added earnestly. "Greylen dies along with Jesse."  
  
"Ah ... you know what," Steve said and grabbed his jacket, "I won´t even try. Let´s just go."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Greylen Reddick ´s house turned out to be a villa at the far end of the city.  
  
"Psychology sells," Steve stated when they parked across the street.  
  
"No kidding," Amanda nodded. "This house must be worth a fortune. Why didn´t she sell it? She didn´t use it, anyway."  
  
"Memories, I guess," Mark said and shrugged. "Or maybe the house means ..."  
  
"Don´t start, Dad! Let´s just hope you´re right about Jesse."  
  
From the mere look of the inner rooms, it was obvious that theis house hadn´t seen a human being in years. Spider-webs were placed decoratively all over the furnitures, which were covered with dust, and the once beautiful walls had lost their colors and gracefullness.  
  
"What a shame," Amanda stated when looking around. "This must have been so beautiful."  
  
"Yeah, why don´t you make an offer? I´m sure Oak will sell it sometime soon now."  
  
"Funny. So - where do we look first? It´s one big house."  
  
"Right," Mark nodded, "we oughta split up. I´m going to check upstairs."  
  
"And I´m up-upstairs,"Amanda added and pointed above their heads, where the stairs led - seemingly - to the sky. "It really is one big house, huh?"  
  
"`kay, you do that, I´ll stay down here.  
  
As the other two climbed up the stairs, Steve scanned the room. "Okaaay, if I was a psycho, where would I hide the little guy?" he murmured under his breath, but couldn´t betray himself over the fact that he was joking out of fear. What if they didn´t find Jesse here? Or, even worse, what if they didn´t find him alive? What if it was him who´d find him?  
  
Shaking his head as if to clear it, he made a firm step in the direction of the hallway to start his search.  
  
Think positive, he ordered himself. Think happy ending, Jesse fine, stuff like that. Yeah, he´s probably already waiting and will yell at you for being so damn late. Right.  
  
As if actually believing what he thought, he fastened his steps and even called his friend´s name once. Yet, the sound of his own fear-filled voice startled him and he decided to keep his search a non-verbal one in the future.  
  
He´d checked the kitchen and what seemed to be a small study, and was just entering the hallway again, when he noticed the door to his right, next to the house door. He hadn´t noticed it before.  
  
The cellar.  
  
All doubt about wether or not his friend was still alive gone, he hastened to open the door and ran down the stairs which led to an equally big cellar with several rooms.  
  
Despite himself, he called out once more. "Jesse?"  
  
There was no response but his feeling continuing to sent him further down into the cellar, till he reached the first door. A wine cellar.  
  
No doctor in it.  
  
The next one seemed to have been be Dr. Greylen´s lab in the old days, but since Jesse wasn´t in there, too, Steve didn´t bother to look.  
  
"Come on, Jess," he muttered, when turning to the next door. "I know you´re here somewhere."  
  
Tentatively,as if afraid of another disappointment, Steve pushed the door open - and froze.  
  
The room was not more than a store room, that is, it had been one once, referring to the big, iron boards, which were empty now.  
  
And there, huddled on the floor, leaning against one of the boards´ pillars, his knees drawn to his nose, his hands bound behind his back, was Jesse. He didn´t look up and had obviously not noticed Steve entering.  
  
"Jess?" Steve asked, surprised at how small his voice sounded. It had come out as a mere whisper.  
  
But now he could hear another noise in the room. Straining to hear, he found that it was Jesse mumbling the names of all the bones in a human´s hand. Over and over and over again.  
  
"Jesse," Steve said, a little louder now and took a step towards his friend. He feared to startle him, the memory of Jesse scared in the kitchen still all too vivid in his mind.  
  
"Jesse, it´s me."  
  
The young man didn´t look up, but continued his own private lecture. A slight shiver ran through his body once, but subsided quickly.  
  
Steve frowned. It looked as if Jesse had flinched away ever so slightly from something. Something Steve couldn´t see. As he kept on staring at his young friend in unease, realization suddenly dawned.  
  
"Oh my ... You´re still ... Jess!" he called out and finally crouched down beside the doctor, the discovered horror urging him to gently take hold of the smaller man´s shoulders.  
  
"Jesse, please, look up. It´s me, Steve. C´mon, it´s over now."  
  
When there was still no response from the young man but his continued mumbles, Steve placed a hand under his friend´s chin to carefully lift his head.  
  
"Hey, look at ..."  
  
He stopped in midsentence and winced when he finally got a look at Jesse´s face.  
  
A heavy bruise covered most of his right temple and also lay like a frame around the tape which kept his right eye closed.  
  
Now that he´d felt a touch not only brushing him, but one that had actually been able to move him, Jesse had fallen silent aprubtly and swallowed hard in fear.  
  
It took the detective a moment, though, to notice his friend´s increasing shivering.  
  
"Jesse," he said urgently, unconsciously speaking slower and clearer than before, "it´s me, Steve. We found you. We´ll bring you back to the hospital. It´s over. We found out about Oak and everything. - Can you hear me?" he added when Jesse gave absolutely no sign of comprehension.  
  
Instead of that, the doctor struggled slightly against Steve´s grib, and when the detective drew his hand away, bowed his head again.  
  
"Jess?" Steve asked desperately, glancing back at the door as if waiting for help to come. He wondered wether he should leave Jesse alone to go and get his Dad. But, though he didn´t doubt he was as frightened as the young shivering man in front of him, he couldn´t bring himself to stand up and go. No way. And coming to think about it - the situation Steve Sloan couldn´t handle still had to be created!  
  
"Listen to me!" he ordered his friend firmly. "Listen to my voice. You recognize me, don´t ya? Come on, Jess, talk to me!"  
  
It seemed to take Jesse an eternity to finally shake his head slightly. "N- not real," he muttered, a little louder than his mumbling before, so that Steve could make out the horaseness of his voice.  
  
"No!" the detective objected. "Real! I´m real." As if to prove it, he nudged Jesse friendly. "You felt that, didn´t you? You hear me. I´m really here."  
  
"No," Jesse whispered pleadingly and shook his head a little harder. "Not ... this. Please not. I take back all the bad things I said about you, Caspar, `kay, but don´t do this."  
  
Understanding, Steve winced in sympathy. His freshly found self-confidence vanished with rapid speed as he desperately tried to figure out what to do.  
  
"No, Jess, I´m really here!" he repeated. "I know you´re hearing them and you probably can feel them, too, but they can´t do that, can they?" And out of a sudden inspiration, he tore the tape off Jesse´s left eye.  
  
As the scream subsided, Steve stared at the tape in his hand, only just realizing what he´d just done.  
  
"Uh ... ah ... sorry."  
  
Still gasping from the pain, Jesse blinked once, but couldn´t clear his blurried vision. Yet, the proof had be sufficient as it seemed, because a deep frown settled on his forehead, till he ever so hopefully asked:  
  
"St-Steve?"  
  
"Yeah!" the detective replied happyly. "Yeah, it´s me. We found you."  
  
"That really you?" the young man asked, overwhelming relief all too clear in his voice.  
  
"Do I have to prove it?"  
  
"No!" Jesse hastened to call out and made a face. "I believe you." Still, he flinched when Steve patted his shoulder assuringly.  
  
"Sorry," they said in union, then smiled, though it was a little shaky on Jesse´s side.  
  
"Oak ..." he started, but was interrupted by Steve.  
  
"We know. Don´t worry, we got her. She won´t be able to harm anyone again."  
  
To Steve´s surprise, Jesse bowed his head with a sad expression on his face. An uncomfortable silence was to begin, when, to Steve´s great relief, Mark called out for his son from above.  
  
"I´m down here, Dad," Steve called back. "In the cellar. I found him." Turning back to Jesse, he explained: "Dad and Amanda are here, too. You scared the hell out of us all, you know," he teased and started to untie Jesse´s hands, freezing before his hands touched Jesse´s skin, though.  
  
"I´m going to untie you now," he informed him.  
  
"Hm," Jesse nodded uncomfortably, and couldn´t help still flinching away when he felt his friend´s hands. "I-I´m sorry," he stuttered.  
  
"Don´t be," Steve mumbled, but found that not even he himself could believe his own words. Therefore he was once more relieved to hear his Dad´s and Amanda´s voices filling the room.  
  
"Jesse!"  
  
Within a second they were sitting next to him, and Mark reached out to get a better look on his abused temple.  
  
When Jesse flinched violently at his touch, he drew away his hand instantly.  
  
"I´m sorry," Jesse said hastily before Mark himself could apologize. "I´m ..." He laughed slightly, nervously. "I don´t know why that keeps happening."  
  
"You don´t have to be sorry," Amanda said soothingly, but had to stop herself from touching him, too. "We found you and that´s all that matters. It´s all going to be okay now. We´ll remove this thing and ..."  
  
"I-I´m not crazy, am I?"  
  
"No, you´re not," Mark said assuringly. "I´m so sorry, Jesse."  
  
"We all are," Steve added. He´d finished his task of freeing Jesse from his bounds and watched in sympathy as the smaller man slowly moved his hands, wincing in pain.  
  
Out of a reflex, Mark reached out to take a look at Jesse´s injured wrists, but was stopped with his hand in the air by Steve giving him a talk-sign with his hand.  
  
Understanding, Mark said: "I´m going to take a look at your wrists now, alright?"  
  
"It´s okay," Jesse objected. "Hurts a little, but it´s okay."  
  
When Mark took his right arm anyway, he jerked away in fear.  
  
"Craps," he muttered when a silence of dismay followed, then outstretched his arm for Mark to look at it.  
  
"I´m sorry. I-it´s because I can´t see anything. It´s going to be better once ..."  
  
"Yeah, why did she do that?" Amanda asked and stopped only inches from his face which she had planed to turn for her to see the bruise on his temple. Catching a glance of Steve, she placed her hands behind her back instead.  
  
"She wanted to prevent me from ... seeing them," Jesse explained, embarrassed. "Didn´t work."  
  
Since none of them knew what to say, Mark decided to turn to medicine, safe ground.  
  
"May I take a look at your right side, Jess? We´ve to get this thing off you."  
  
"You don´t have to ask," the young man shot back, more desperately than in anger. "And you don´t have to warn me every time you touch me, okay?"  
  
"Okay," Mark said friendly, smiling in sympathy, which he knew Jesse would hear in his voice, and gently turned the younger man´s face to the right.  
  
Jesse flinched.  
  
"Damn it!"  
  
"Jesse, it´s okay. As you said, it´ll go away soon. Right now ..."  
  
"Just tear it off, `kay? It´s far less painfull when it´s just ..."  
  
The scream following Mark´s sudden action could have deafened a dog.  
  
As the brutalized victim sat panting, covering his eyes with his hands, Mark turned to glance at the others apologetically.  
  
"Sorry, I should have told you to cover your ears."  
  
"What?" Steve asked and rubbed his ears.  
  
"You okay, Jess?" Amanda demanded worriedly.  
  
"Y-yeah," he replied softly, his hands still covering his face. "I guess. That was one mean thing to do," he complained and lifted his head as if to look at Mark, though he still couldn´t open his eyes.  
  
"You said ..."  
  
"I know what I said, but since when does it matter what I say?"  
  
Smiling in relief when he saw Jesse´s humor starting to work again, Mark looked at the bruise now fully free to see, and winced. "We´ve to bring you to the hospital. You probably have a concussion."  
  
"Not to mention the science-fiction-thing," Steve added.  
  
"The what?"  
  
"A nanobot," Amanda explained. "Oak Reddick injected you with a nanobot. Like Pinter and Dillard."  
  
"Na ..." Jesse started confusedly, but interrupted himself when he had to flinch violently.  
  
Since no one of the team had touched him, they exchanged worried glances.  
  
"Okay," he gasped, "I take it that wasn´t anyone of you guys, huh?"  
  
"No."  
  
"Get this thing outta me fast," he whispered in telltale fear. "Please."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
"How is he?"  
  
Lifting his head at Amanda´s voice, Steve saw his dad entering the Doctor´s Lounge and quickly swept a hand over his exhausted features. He´d actually dozed off, he found surprisedly. The latest events had finally taken their toll as it seemed.  
  
"Better," Mark answered, equally tired, and sank down next to his son on the sofa. "His vision´s clearing at last. He could make out my features for a few minutes, I think. It´ll be okay in the morning."  
  
"That´s great news," Amanda sighed in relief.  
  
"Yeah," Mark nodded without sounding the part. "The non-great part, though, is that he´s also still seeing ... them."  
  
He wanted to add something else, but obviously found he couldn´t, and drew in a deep, calming breath, before he continued: "It´s horrible. He grew so frightened and agitated again that we had to sedate him."  
  
"Oh god," Amanda whispered in despair. "Will this never end?"  
  
"Yes, it will," Steve stated firmly. "Right, Dad? You´re gonna take this goddamn thing outta him, and everything´s goin´ to be fine again. - Right?" he repeated when there was no answer but a sad, doubtfull look.  
  
"No. Yes. Well - we can´t actually remove it. It´s too small to see and ... We don´t know where it is."  
  
"Ahm ... And what exactly are you gonna do then?"  
  
"Based on what was found in Oak ´s lab, Shaugnessy believes it possible to create another nanobot himself, which will be programmed to destroy the other one and repair whatever damage had been done by it. Which we´ll have to find out about first, meaning we´ll run a lot of tests."  
  
"How long will that take?" Steve asked dreadfully.  
  
"Hopefully not long. A week maybe. Two. Dunno. If Jesse´s co-operating, that is. But - considering how much his condition has worsened, I´d say it´s not very likely he´s going to co-operate. I don´t think he could if he wanted to. And of course we can´t keep him sedated for a week. It´s going to be ... hard. To say the least."  
  
Frustrated, Steve swept a hand over his face again. "Damn it!" he yelled, but apologized in an instant.  
  
Slightly smiling in sympathy, Amanda stood up as if to make a speech. "We can´t change anything about this. But we can be there."  
  
"I don´t think that´ll be a great comfort for him," Steve sighed and earned a surprised look from Mark. The doctor frowned, he´d never seen his son that hopeless.  
  
"Yes it will!" he therefore objected with much more force than he´d have done otherwise and cast his son a firm glance. "If he´s seeing them, we´ll have to make sure he´s seeing us, too."  
  
"Right," Amanda nodded. "Till he can be injected with that anti-bot, he won´t be alone. One of us will always stay with him. We´ll take turns."  
  
"Right."  
  
Confronted with a made decision and two very questioning expressions, Steve surrendered and even managed to smile tiredly. "You´re probably right."  
  
"´course we are," Mark said. "We´re doctors. - I´ll take the first turn. And you two should go home and get some sleep. I´ll keep you pos ..."  
  
"What about his parents?" Amanda interrupted him.  
  
Mark hesitated, but finally answered: "He doesn´t want them to know about ... all this. He said he couldn´t bear dead people and his parents."  
  
"Are you gonna call them, anyway?" Steve asked, for he knew his father pretty well.  
  
Though he cast his son a smile for the teasing reply, Mark shook his head sadly. "No, I won´t. He doesn´t need more people to be afraid of."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
As much as he cared about his best friend, Steve hated his turns. Though the young man was asleep most of the time, exhausted by the tests and the constant tension he felt, Steve hated every minute he had to spent with him. Helpless he felt, unneeded, unsensitive, guilty.  
  
And the normally much enjoyed drabbles with his friend didn´t help much, for they were forced. Unnatural attempts of over-playing the situation they were in: Two friends in a hospital; none of the silences they shared were comfortable these days.  
  
Sighing deeply, Steve rubbed his thumb over his eyes.  
  
"Hey, new rule! If you fall asleep over the cards, I´m allowed to look at them," Jesse´s voice drew his attention back to the here and now which happened to be a poker game.  
  
Opening his eyes, Steve frowned in mock annoyance. "I dozed off cause you play poker like chess."  
  
"Naw, I´m not! We´re playing for about five minutes now and I haven´t los ... Wait, that was an insult, right?"  
  
"Wow, if you were that bright when playing poker, you could actually bea ... Jess?" he asked alarmed when Jesse´s expression suddenly changed from amusement to fear.  
  
"It´s nothing," the younger man winked shakily. He wanted to add another wise-crack, but had to close his eyes in fright all of a sudden. A slight shudder ran through his body.  
  
"Y-ya know," he stuttered, trying unsuccessfully to keep up his casual tone, "I´m just letting you wi ..."  
  
"Jesse! Stop that! Talk to me. What´re you seeing? - Damn it!" Steve burst out when there was no reply, and Jesse opened his eyes in startled surprise.  
  
"Steve?"  
  
"This has been going on for a whole week now, Jess! You refuse to let me help you."  
  
"I ... no ... I-it´s ..."  
  
"You talk to the others. Why can´t you tell me?"  
  
"It´s not that ... I´m ... Gawd, sorry, Steve, I ... I didn´t mean to ... Don´t be mad at me."  
  
Steve felt like crying. Considering Jesse´s expression, he looked like it, too. "Jesse, I´m not mad at you. I just wanna help you, but I get the feeling you don´t want me to ..."  
  
"But you are!" Jesse objected hastily. "You don´t treat me like I was ... I wanna feel normal, and, well, you sorta ... I need this, I really do. You´re not, like ... Gee, don´t you wanna stop me from getting all emotional here?"  
  
"Did you say something?" Steve asked, but couldn´t help presenting his friend with a bright grin. "Ah, Full House, by the way," he added and lay his cards down on the bed.  
  
"Oh you can´t be serious! You´re cheating on a sick guy?!"  
  
"Cheating?"  
  
Before Jesse could either repeat his accusation or desperately try to talk himself out of the situation, Mark and Amanda entered the room happyly, both looking like they were about to party.  
  
"Hey!" Amanda greeted the patient and placed a soft kiss on his forehead. "How´re you doing? Oh, don´t bother, ´cause you´ll feel much greater in a minute when we´ve told you that ..."  
  
"Shaugnessy´s done," Mark interrupted her wickedly and grinned at her disappointed glance.  
  
"I wanted to tell him!"  
  
"So did I."  
  
"He´s done?" Jesse asked uncertainly. "What you mean? Done as in done with the tests, which I´d find enough reason to cheer about, or done as in ... done," he finished the sentence slowly.  
  
"You´ll be injected with the anti-bot tomorrow morning and then we´ll see. If it´s working, you´ll probably be released the next day."  
  
"Uh ... that´s great, huh?" Jesse asked and tried to smile slightly, but couldn´t quite fight off the unease that accompanied the information.  
  
"I know, it´s scarry," Amanda said sympathically, "but it´ll work, you´ll see."  
  
"Hopefully."  
  
"It will, trust me," she repeated firmly and ruffled his hair. "It´s all going to turn out just fine."  
  
"Still, it feels kinda strange to ... you know ..."  
  
"Don´t worry, we´ll stay with you all the time," Mark promised and smiled at a gratefull, yet somewhat embarrassed glance.  
  
"Naw, that´s really nice of you and all, but ... You´ve done more than enough, I mean, I don´t know how I ..."  
  
"Jess, what did we say about getting emotional?" Steve interrupted him.  
  
"That you didn´t hear it."  
  
Mark frowned slightly in amusement, but then bowed his head a little as he said: "Jesse, ahm, I never told you how sorry we all are. We ..."  
  
"Yes, you did," Jesse replied, "and I don´t know why you did it then. You safed my life, remember?"  
  
"Just accept it," Amanda said gently. "We´re sorry. We should have noticed. We´ll never again believe you´re insane. Never. Promise. "  
  
Chuckling, Jesse nodded gratefully.  
  
"Okay," Mark said after a short moment of a comfortable silence, "you wanna say goodbye to Sarah and the others?"  
  
"Ah ..." Surprised by the question, Jesse thought about it, till an almost wise smile settled on his face. "Naw, don´t think so. I´m just gonna go to sleep now."  
  
"Why not?" Amanda asked.  
  
"Would seem to much like a goodbye," the young man explained.  
  
Looking from Mark´s proud look to Amanda´s equally relieved one, Steve frowned. "Hey, wait, you understand this, don´t you?"  
  
"I´ll explain it to you later," Mark assured his son and chuckled at Steve´s desperate look.  
  
"Why is it even the kid understands this psycho-crab, but not me?!"  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The door was open, though the sign was already turned to "closed".  
  
First he frowned at it, but soon his expression changed into a smile, and finally he entered the bar with a casual "Hey Jess!".  
  
Looking up from his task, the young man smiled back. "Hey Steve. What´re you doing here? It´s my turn, remember?"  
  
"I thought you were told to go home and get some rest."  
  
"It´s my turn."  
  
"Ah ... ´kay, you´re the doctor, doctor. So", Steve said and glanced at the glass in front of his friend, "care to make me one of those, too?"  
  
"Sure. Here you are," Jesse replied and produced a glass of what he was drinking. At Steve´s expression, he lifted his brows innocently. "I´m still on medication."  
  
"Milk´s ... fine. Just fine. Thanks."  
  
Silence settled tiredly, preparing itself for a quiet evening, till suddenly the door opened slightly.  
  
"Ah ...Excuse me ..." a stranger´s voice announced.  
  
"We´re closed!" the owners called out in union without looking up from their drinks.  
  
"But I just wanted to ..."  
  
"Closed! Out!"  
  
"Gee, sorry I´m alive!" the poor man replied and closed the door behind him, leaving them to their much deserved, long missed silence of two friends in a bar, drinking milk.  
  
  
  
THE END 


End file.
